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About The Butler herald. (Butler, Ga.) 1875-1962 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 17, 1885)
m £ BUTLER HERALD. W, N. BENNS, Editor and Proprietor. “LET THEKE BE LIGHT.” Subscription, $1.50 in Advance. BUTLER, GEORGIA, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER IT, 1885. NUMBER 3. Comfort. Hast thou o’er Ibo clear heaven of thy goal Seen tempests roll ? Hast thou watch’d all the hopes thou would’st havo wort Fade, one by one ? Wait till the clouds are past, then raise thine eyes To bluer skies ! Hast thou gone sadly through a dreary night, And found no light; No guide, no star, to cheer thco through the plain— No friend, save pain ? Wait, and thy soul shall see, when most fbr- lorn, , Rise a new morn. Hast thou beneath another’s stern contr Bent thy sad soul, And wasted sacred hopes and precious tears ? Yet calm thy tears, For thou cunst gain even from the bitterest part, A stronger heart! «-- Has Fate o’erwhelmed thee with some sudden blow ? Let thy tenrs flow; But know when storms aro past, the heavens api More pure, more clear; ivhen farthest from their shining And n For blighter davs* •und life a cheat, and worn in vain ron chain ? ful bent beneath earth's h ;avy bond? Look thou beyond; II life is bill or there forever sliiuo f" Hopes more divine ! Art thou^pno! and does thy soul complain It lives in vain ? Not vainly floes lie live who can endure. '• 0 be thou sure, That he win hopes and buffers hero can enrn A sure return. Hast, thou found nought within thy troubled life Save toward strife ? Hast thou found all &he piomised thee, Deceit, fluid hope a cheat ? Eudure, ainTpfliere shall dawn within tliy breast Eternal rest, A Letter and a Telegram. “I don’t never waste words,” said old Mr. Brown, in a hard, driving voice, “and I hain’t good at letter- writin’, but I reckon this’n will cut!” “It’s a pity you writ it so hard, father,” said his young daughter, trembling; “it’ll hurt her to the heart; she didn’t never mean to borry that #300, and then cheat you out o’ it.” “She didn’t, eh ? Then why hain’t the money back in my pocket, safe and sound! It’s a year last Christmas since she pestered me ’bout it, and I bain't seen hide nor hair on’t yet; if that hain’t a clear case o' cheatin’, Fanny, I'll like jto know what ye call The girl stopped churning a mo ment, and wipijd a surreptitious tear ir «m her eyelid 1 before she answered,: ,-f 'a;l it. notging, fathor, but b. i ’!;; wVn '•ioffer Hart lock.' o ', 1 ' iofbr Mary borryed that money o lift the mortgage, she ex pected to pay it back; hut you know as how Brother John lie was took with the rheumatics, and the overllow came, and the crop was ruint and then she couldn’t pay; that’s all, and God knows it’s enough!” “Twasn’t my fault,” snapped her father, tiercely, as he pounded on the kitchen table to give vent to his an ger. •pi never put it in the agree ment to ’low for overflows, and rheu matics, and sich like, and I never would ha’ lent her the #300 if it hadn’t been for your snifflin’ and pesterin’. And now ye hear gal, not anuthcr dime o’ my earnins shall they ever smell, and I’ll never forgive .” The girl sprang up from the churn, crying, “No, father, don’t say it— don't, don't say it, father; you’ll he sor ry some day when it’s too late; be sides you’re a church member, you know!" '•You’re right ’bout that,” said Mr. Brown, perversely; “I'm a church member, and don’t owe nary a person a red cent, and the Bible says, ‘an eye for in eye, and a tooth for a tooth,’ and I'm a going to have it!” He pounded ihe table again with his fists, after a fashion he had of wanting to pound something or some body when he felt particularly aggres sive. But the sound of his voice had scarcely died away, when there came a knock at the door, and one of those o^rnous, yellow envelopes, marked the impress of the Western Un- I Telegrah Company, was handed Mr. BrowD took it, and lodked it |r in a helpless kind of fashion he re breaking the seal. “IIow much t<J pay,” he asked the boy, and passed over to him the change with tremb ling hand; though it was characteris tic! of thu man that even then, with the knowledge that the telegram must contain terrible news, he was careful to count the dimes as they drop ped back into his pocket. Oil. those cruel telegrams! Do the company ev er remorsefully count the breaking that are left in the wake of Messengers? Mr. Brown was a han, and loved his money-bags fell, but somewhere beneath the outward crusts there was an Ig affection for bi3 children that Id something like the stirring of |il around the violet-beds, to loos- r.e selfisn bonds, and give his a human voice. And when he [these words, "Mary died this j; come at onc^^ji great, sud fetish filled ling tl visits. He did not cry out or fall, or make any sign that he was grief- stricken. but he was hurt to the soul, and a great remorse made him sick and faint. He had never put it in the agreement about sickness, over flows; and bad crops, as he had just said; neither had he “put it” that Mary, in her young blooming matron- hood days, should die—his first born ? How could he hear it? and it was all the harder because of the cruel words he had uttered while she lay dead at home. Did he say he would never forgive her—-did he really— really say that? Fanny had tried to stop h-iui, and brought it to his mind that he was a “church member” and a Christian. As if a father ought to be merely o Christian to his own child. Why hadn’t he given her the money? Might have done so five times over and never missed it. And the old man groaned remorsefully, as with these thoughts in his heart, his gaze wandered over the great fields where the cotton would soon be a shimmer ing, fleecy sea, bringing new treasures to his hoarded gains, and making no hearts happy save liis own. Those few, poor, stunted acres of John’s and Mary’s! Swamped by the overflow last spring, stock drowned, and John, wading waist deep, fighting with the waters, laid up with the rheumatics. Suppose he had given ’em a thou sands dollars! Oh, the sting of remembering evil whon it is too late to turn evil into good. And then there was that un kind letter. Did his child read those cruel words With the dying light in her eyes, or Would it he left for the strick en husband to be treated to the short, stern homily! He went hack to the kitchen, where' Fanny sat crying over the telegram. “Lock up the house,” he said in a hur ried way, for fear of his voice would falter; "we’ll go at once. I’ll hitch up while ye get ready.” And when they had started on their long journey he quite broke down in talking over the past and telling Fanny little things here and there that no one would have supposed he had remembered. “Mary was alius a dutiful da’arter,” he said, putting into broken sentences the grief and remorse that overwhelm ed him; “after her ma died, and she wasn’t knee-high to a duck, she was like a second pairent to Ihe little tins; nussed ’em through the measles, and when they was well, took it herself, and laid as quiet on the bed for fear o’ giving trouble as if she warn’t a child.” He didn’t tell her of how, when the second Mrs. Brown was installed as mistress, Mary became the drudge and maid-of-all-work, and was nurse to a half-dozen more little Browns, who, like their mother, ruled her with a rod of iron. Nor of Mary’s marriage with a sturdy, young fellow, who, for the lack of a little timely help, and the pressure of a large family, was kept with his nose to the perpetual grind stone. He did not tell how Mary pinched and worked, and sat up till late hours, and struggled to help her family, until in consequence of doc tor’s bills and babies, and poor crops, John was forced to give a mortgage on his house, when her (the father) might have lifted them out of their poverty. He might even have given them a better house; the oldest inhab itant couid n t. remember when the ugly, ramshackle affair had been built. Some ancient ancestors had put up a couple of rooms, then added on a few more, until, wlu.t with patching and propping up. John’s inheritance was an offence to the eye. Mr. Brown thought bitterly of all this through the long journey. Too late, too late seemed written in words of lire on every tree and shrub. At last the house was in sight; a poor, miserable place enough, hut now, in the month of June, sweet with climbing roses and honeysuckle that the mistress’s hand had trained to the porch. “Who-o-o, Dandy.” The children were in the yard; with a shout they ran to the gate, and as the old horse stopped, somebody rushed down the steps, and with a cry, "Why father, why Fanny,” Mary in her famous clean calico and apron, and cheeks likes roses, with the pleasuie and ex citement of the visit, was in her fath er’s arms—her father, who held her as he had never done before, and kissed her with the tears running down his face “My child,” he said presently, “you were dead, and are alive again. Thank God!” “Why, father?” questioned Mary again, what on earth is the matter?” And she looked with frightend gaze at her sister,- vaguely wondering if her father were stricken witli some sud den insanity. For answer, Fanny drew out tho telegram from her pock et, and gave it to Mary. “It’s all a wonderful mistake,” ex claimed the elder woman, glancing it over, and hugging father and sister excitedly agaiu. “We have a neigh bor, Mrs. Mary Harris, who died last evening; she has a brother living some where near you, and by the way, his \vn—Richard Brown— carried you What a as to get And so, between hysterical sobs and smiles, and everybody talking at once, and asking questions that no one dreamed of answering, they tvent in under the bower of roses and honey suckle, and presently John hobbled from the field on crutches, Und tho j story was told all over again, j And when Mary slipped out into j the kitchen to get an early supper, old 1 Mr Brown followed here and there, and she was folded tight in her fath er’s arms again, while the tears streamed downed both their faces. It was as if she had been raised from the dead. “My child,” whispered the old man, “I hain’t been the best of fathers to ye; I ha’ shut my eyes and my heart when I ought to ha’ been the one to help ye; never ye mind ’bout that money; don’t ye say one word ’bout it, and we’ll knock this old rattletrap down to-morrow, and I’ll show ye how to build a house! ” And so he did, and a very comforta ble house it was, where John did not have to stoop when he Went in and out of doors. And would you bJievo it? The letter, all the mote harsh for being so brief, never did reach its des tination, Old Mr. Brown’s chiro- grapby was of a very inferior sort; and the postmaster couldn’t puzzle out the address, much as he desired so to do; then the letter was forwarded to the Dead Letter Office at Washington; and in due time was returned to Mr. Brown, who quietly and satisfactorily consigned it to the flames, MAKING SPURIOUS COIN. tioW Counterfeiters Defraud the Government, fhe Extent to Which the Business is Carried on in This Country; Novel Corn Planting; The means used in planting corn in the semi arid Kansas belt enables that region to raise good crops of the great fattening grain of the United States It is by means of the listing plow, which throws the soil into high ridges, the middles being deeply pulverized in addition. In the trendies the corn is planted down in the permanently ; moist soil of the trenches, these being : filled up in the process of cultivation. I This trench, as plowed, is Y-shaped, j and sixteen inches deep. Until the j corn gets strong, an inverted trough j covers the rows as the cultivator pass- : es, preventing the plows from rolling ; the soil over the plants. When the J com is ready for the second cultiva tion the trough is laid aside. The | shovels are set to throw the earth to the corn plants, now strong and two feet tall, and they are also set to take the groitn^ajfeeply. This cultivation throws aii^JF. all the earth into the ' trench that the lister threw out. The weeds are deeply buried. The surface of the field is level. The main roots of the corn-plants are at least ten | inches below the surface of the ground and how much further they have sunk j into the rich,damp, underlying ground, no one knows. But now no ordinary drought affects the plants. The hot southwest winds can blow, the mercu- j ry can rise until tho integrity of the j thermometer i3 threatened, the sun j can course across a cloudless sky for : weeks, hut the coin leaves do not foil, ■ The plants thrive, and; if a soaking rain falls between the middle of June and the middle of July, the listed corn will make a full crop.—New York Sun. Insanity in the I'nited States. The increase of insanity in the United States during recent years is quite amazing, One is inclined to | douot whether the figures given can i possibly he correct; but they are offiei- i ally authenticated Statistics show that in 1865 the number of insane : people in the States was 24,042, a small percentage. In five years the number re.ichod 37,432, and in 1880 ! the figures had grown to the surpris ing total of 91,959. In all probability the authorities have had until lately a careless system of investigation, and many lunatics have escaped enumera tion. Even allowing a liberal margin for this, however, there seems reason to believe that insanity has claimed ! and is claiming an increasing number ! of victims. The race of life is run at a greater pace than it was, and the pressure is greater in consequence. Many organizations give way under the strain. It is said that the increase has been most rapid in the Western Stales, hut no reason is suggested, and it would he deeply interesting to know why, for the causes which are in force there are doubtless in force elsewhere. The increase in insanity during the ten years from 1870 to 1880 was near ly 150 per cent., it is stated. From 1865 it is still greater, and, though this is far from a subject of jest, it may be wondered whether, if the pro portion is maintained, it will not soon be necessary to calculate the small percentage qt inhabitants of the West ern States who retain their sanity.-— London Standard. A Weather Prophet. It is possible, according to French authority, to foretell the weather, sometimes ten or twenty hours in ad vance, by observing and comparing the sounds wmitted by a telephone connected leads with two iron bars stuck into the ground a few yards apart. In case dUa thanderstorm es- especially, a noise like that of shiver ing leaves increases* until a flash of lightning occurs, driien the soul resembles that of minktJjAiK on grass. The extent to which counterfeiting (s carried on will probably never be known to a certainty, but that it is one of the greatest dangers to which the public is exposed as far as swind ling schemes are concerned there can be no doubt. Even the severe penal ty and the vigilant work of the Secret Service Department of the government has failed to wipe out this evil, as is evident e^ery now and then when a new arrest is made, and the machine ry of the counterfeiters captured. An officer of the Secret Service is authori ty for the statement that counterfeit ing is more extensively practiced than is generally believed. Paper money is imitated so closely that experts sometimes fail to notice the imposi tion, and coin of every description is counterfeited, It is singular that hut one counterfeit #20 gold piece has ever been discovered, and this hears the date 1850. In making this a genuine double eagle Was split, one side being left thicker than the other. As much gold H3 possible was then scooped out of the thick side, and a mixture of platinum and some other metal sub stituted to bring it up to the standard weight. It is what is known as a “filled coin,” and is worth from #7 to #8. A #10 gold piece filled in the same way is worth from #3 to #4 50. There are quite a number oflflO coun terfeits. The dates of these filled or counterfeits are 1841-47-49-55-61-75 -79 and ’80; The one considered the most dangerous is dated 1847. The first counterfeit half-eagle, or #5 gold piece, that the secret service discover ed was issued in 1850, and no less than twenty-two have appeared since then, some of these being absolutely worthless, while others are worth from #2.70 to $1.63 each. The ones dated 1882 are the most skillfully exe cuted counterfeits known. Gold pieces are not counterfeited so much as silver coin, for the reason that gold counterfeit coins are made from dies and not cast. The manufacturers of the “queer” must buy the gold, which requires, of course, corsiderable capi tal, and the machinery is not only ex pensive, hut of such large proportions as to make it liable to detection. In manufacturing counterfeit silver dol lars almost any ingenious mechanic can do it after a little experience. The machinery required is very simple, be ing only plaster of paris molds, genu ine coin, hrittania, block tin, lead, anc, silver wash. The spurious coins are hard to detect. The weight test is the most accurate and reliable, especially, with gold cuin. The Treasury De partment has a set of maximum and minimum weights, which distinguish the weights of all coins. For example the maximum of a $20 gold piece is 516 grains and the minimum 513.42 grains. The difference is exactly one half of 1 per cent., the amount allow ed by law. A great deal of coin becomes light from natural causes and when they come into the hands of the national Treasury they are sent to the mint and recoined, the government hearing the loss. As a general thing nothing smaller than a $10 gold piece is ever filled, thuiigh the smaller coins are plugged, which is perhaps the most common. A new process, however, has taken the place of plugging to a great extent, and is called “sweating.” Some photographers are credited with doing this kind of thing. The modus optramli of this new process is to take a number of gold or silver pieces and suspend them in some acid for a few moments, and then withdraw them. By using fresh coins a considerable quantity of metal is obtained without reducing the weight of the pieces to any great extent, and they are then passed off again on the public. Some times as much as fifty cents in value is taken from a $5 gold piece, and as much as eighty cents has been known to have been taken from a double eagle. Another way of tampering with double eagles is to remove their rough edges and remill them. Be tween fifty and eighty cents can be obtained in this way from a single coin, and the difference is not percept ible to the naked eye. Silver coin that is less than the minimum weight is rejected by the Treasury officials, and the owners are obliged to pass them if they can or sell them for bul lion. Some unscrupulous brokers buy them for shipment to Canada where maximum and minimum weight are not considered, and they pass for face value. The government, however, has stopped this to a certain extent by stamping on the face of each the word “light.” The silver dollar is called the vagabond of all coins, ;is it is tamper ed with and counterfeited so much. Silver coin will not permit of as much tampering with as gold coj^ For in stance, take a $20 gold p and punch holes through and if thjweight has ed fro worth from 83 to 86 cents. The latest swindle relating to spurious money is the split bank note fraud. A #20 note i3 taken, and by soine ingenious method the note is split in two, and the raw Side “doctered up,” and each half IS passed off as genuine $20 note. The tvork is dorte sO aftistically in most cases that it is difficult at first to detect the fraud;—Philadelphia Bul letin: . Elephants in Btirmah; A correspondent to the Providence Jouimal, writing from Rangoon, Bur- inah, says: I saw one Of the white elephants about two months ago at Wimpadaw, on the Sittoung river, then about to start for Mandalay. Rs 10,000 were offered for the young aniirial, only three or four years old. But the' young owner refused the 10,000 and was going himself to Mandalay to pre sent the royal gifts, for which he hoped for Rs30,000 to 50,000, as his grandfather got 50,000 some 25 years ago for a similar animal. The animal appeared to me unusually black and glossy five hundred yards away. I said to the owner; “Why, yeur white elephant is exceedingly black!” “Yes,” said he; “but sir dou’t you see the signs ? ” pointing to scattering hairs in different parts of the body, ofie of two inches longer than the mass, and somewhat white or gray in appear ance. It matters not how black the ele phant is if he lias the “signs,” This is well understood to the initiated, but it makes the outsider smile. It should be understood that the “royal White elephants” worshipped at the courts of Burmah and Siam are never “white,” and need not appear even whitish, and as a matter of fact are often darker than the ordinary ele phant. They have certain “signs” and peculiarities, which are very rare, and which give them their fancied sa credness and value as “luck bedfers” to their royal owners. There are now several “herds” of elephants within one or two days’ journey of Ragoon. I was near one of those herds not long ago. My cartman stopped his bullocks and turned hack to A village and a Zayat because the herd was within hearing, and soon men were hurrying from it and wf.rned ns not to go on. The elephants were marching in a solid body from a great plain near the sea, where they find an abund ance of rich, tender grass, but no good water, to a mountain stream full of pools, not far away, to drink. This they did in the hottest weather every night, but in the cooler weather and with rains, only once in two or three days. “By 3 o’clock in the morning,” said the man, “they will have returned from the pools, and the road will he clear.” This herd is said to number 100 to 200. Some put the number as high as 500. The herd at times, no doubt, divides, especially when food 13 scarce, to graze oyer wider ranges. They are protected by the government —a heavy fine being imposed for kill ing or shooting one, except in self-de fence. If one should kill an elephant, the ivory, bones, skin and flesh must at once be made over to the nearest government official, with the proof of the necesssty of the killing. Human beings are far less secure in life and property in Burmah than elephants. And yet these animals are captured to some extent. I know of an elephant that has in the last 10 years captured no less than 18 of his fellow-beings, and as he has now got his hand in, his owners think him good for three or four each year. Japanese Proverbs. The Japanese me fond of proverbs, and in consequence their language can boast many happy hits. Some of the axi omatic sayings which are accredited to Japan are really of recent introduction into the country, the people absorbing Western expressions with great facil ity. Some few of the following may he traced to other lands, but they are so well known throughout the em- pire as really to deserve the name of Japanese. The Japanese Mrs. Partington is characterized as attempting “to drive away fog with a fan.” An allusion to the usual effect of re venge in an uncivilized country is con tained in the expression, “When you curse, look out for two graves.” It is common with us to say nothing but what is charitable of the dead. In Japan, where the tiger is only known as a rare foreign animal, the saying goes, “Spare the skin of the dead tiger.” Domestic infelicity receives com ment in the phrase, “A three-inch tongue can kill a six-foot man.” Others, more terse, require no ex planation : “The borrower smiles like a saint, and the repayer scowls like a fiend.” •‘The bad artist blame3 his brush.” “Frog spawn becomes frogs.” “Egg plants do not spring from! melon seeds.” ot seek fish on trees.” the net TIMELY TOPICS* In France there is hardly any growth of population; and the French, so far from appreciating this condi tion, are doing their best to alter it. They in fact put a “bounty” on large families by causing seventh ehildren to be supported by the State. She reiiiedy for corpulence, accord ing to the Lallcet, is in the method of eating alid drinking. If we only ate more deliberately, it says,- we should find half of our accustomed quantity of food sufficient to satisfy the most eager cravings of hunger. Let men of all Glasses Who lead healthy lives resolve to eat and drink slowly.- The p: esent population of the city of IftienoS Aytfes is estimated at 400,- 000! One of the local newspapers predicts that in a few years it will be’ the New York of the southern hemi sphere. Emigrants are arriving in a steady stream, and if the proportion of the first six months of the year is kept up, their number will be 150,000 before the 1st of January next. Ital ians form the great majority of the incomers. Getting into debt in Mexico is a se rious business. If a debtor is unable to pay cm the day his debt is due he is arrested and chained to a post for five days. Then an officer looks at him to see if his punishment has enabled him to pay his debt. Of course it hasn’t, and so the debtor’s labor is sold to the government for forty cents a day until the obligation Is discharged. The government sends him with a gang of felons to a silver mine, and he does not see the light again until the debt is discharged. Tbe “Big Woods” of Minnesota well deserve the name, for they coyer 5000 square miles, or 3,200,000 acres of sur face. These woods contain only hard wood growths, including white and black oak; maple; hickory, basswood, elm. Cottonwood, tamarack, and enough other varieties to make an aggregate of over fifty different kinds, 3’he hard wood tract extends in a belt across the middle of the state, and surrounding its northeastern corner is an immense pinC region covering 21,000 square miles, or 13,440,000 acres, One curious revelation of the last census was the growth of the female population of the large cities. It was shown that New York coutains about 25,000 more women than men; Boston has a surplus of 18,000 women; in Baltimore there are 17,000 more women than men, and so on in several others of the large Eastern cities. Fifty years ago it was the men who came to the cities to pursue their careers, while the women stayed at home; hut more recently, women, both in this country and in Europe, have been crowding to ihe business centres. A traveler describes a natural bridge, almost as interesting as the Virginia curiosity, spanning ^cannon, ■ about twenty iniles north of the point where the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad crosses the boundary between New Mexico and Arizona. This bridge is sixty-five feet long and fifteen feet wide at the narrowest point. It con sists of tough grit rock, underneath which the softer sandstones have been worn away to a depth of tweuty-five to forty feet beneath the arch. Near by is a petrified forest. The stone tree trunks lie just beneath the soil, or half exposed, fallen in all directions. This point had never before been vis ited by a white mau. A movement is on foot to erect a monument over the tomb of ex-Fresi- dent William Henry Harrison at North Bend, O. It is on a natural mound in the midst of a pasture lot, and it overlooks the Ohio River. A dilapidated hoard fence, enclosing a space fifty feet square, separates the burial place from the pasture field. Within the enclosure are two or three old cedar trees. The tomb itself is a structure of brick, all underground except the gables, and it is covered with a roof of shingles, that are now dilapitated and rotten. fven the brick walls that show above the ground are covered with a green mould. A sloping cellar door covers the steps which descend to the vault, and even these doors of iron, exposed to the summer rains and winter snows, are eaten through with rust. The Supreme courts in several of the Northwestern States have recently rendered opinipoMflMMgre libs’' work an ij of aotioj son- tic lowing a precedent established some years ago in this State. The anala- goiiff question has also been raised in criminal cases.- Bot there it has been held that a prisoner eannot be com pelled to submit to an examination of his person when such examination may afford evidence against himself. It may be interesting to our readers to know where the bodies of our Pres idents lie. Of the twenty-'tWo that have occupied the chair from 1789 to date, but three are living, Rutherford B, Hayes, Chester A. Arthur and Grover Cleveland, the others are in terred of follows: George Washing ton, at Mount Vernon, Va.; John and John Quincy Adams, at Quincy, Mass.; Thomas Jefferson, at Monticello, Va.; James Madison, at Montpelier, Va.; James Monroe, at Richmond, Va.; An drew Jackson, at his old “Hermitage” home,- eleven miles from Nashville, Tenn.; Martin Van Buren, at Kinder- hook, N. Y r .; William Henry Harrison, at North Bend, Ohio; John Tyler, at Richmond, Va.; James K. Polk, at Nashville, Tenn.; Zachary Taylor, at Frankfort, Ky., Millard Fillmore, at Buffalo, N. YY, Franklin Pierce, at Concord, N. II.; James Buchanan, at Lancaster, Pa.; Abraham Lincoln, at Springfield, 111.; Andrew Johnson, Greenville, Tenn.; James A. Garfield, at Cleveland, Ohio, and Ulysses S. Grant in Riverside Park, New York City, Serpent and Fiddler. Uncle Billy Adams was furnishing the music for a gathering at the resi dence of a well-known planter in Dooley county, given in honor of a visiting young lady from Augusta. The night was warm, and the win dows were thrown open. Miss Alice, weary of dancing, noticed the bird cage hanging among the vines which grew over the veranda, the inmate of which was aroused to its sweetest strains of song hv Uncle Billy's fiddle. Tapping her finger lightly upon the cage, Miss Alice felt the vinebuds playing about her hand. “My God !” exclaimed one of the dancers, as he looked toward the girl, “look there !” A shriek from Miss Alice, and she fell to the Boor. As she fell a huge snake was seen circling down her arm from the cage across her shoulders, and as she lay prostrate gathered itself in a huge coil upon her bosom. With its mouth’wide open, its fangs set, and pressing its head closely by the girl’s cheek, the moment was one of intense excitement. The ominous rattle was heard when Uncle Billy’s fiddle gave forth one of its liveliest airs, and the reptile quickly crawled off, wriggling its way toward the music and out of the house. “I dess knowed dat ’ud fotch um,” said Uncle Billy, as he caressed his instrument. “Does creep- in’ creeturs is a might fond of music.” The reptile was followed and killed, when, it was found to measure eight feet.—Globe Democrat. Petrifactions. Petrified mummies’ eyes are the lat est craze for watch char A human body, buried in a Bristol (N. H.) cemetery nine years ago, was removed and found to be petrified. A petrified snake was recently dis covered in a sandstone rock at Ports mouth, Ohio. A petrified hickory log, four feet long and nine inches in diameter, was found 'lately about eleven feet below the surface, by workmen making an excavation in Greenboro, S. C. Four petrified shark’s teeth, from one-fourth to one-'nalf an incli long, were brought up recently from the Americus (Ga.)'artesian well, which is down some nine hundred odd feet, and has not yet reached a supply of good water. The petrified wood found in the Rocky Mountain regions is rapidly becoming utilized. In San Francisco there is a factory for cutting and polishing the petrifactions into man tel pieces, tiles, tablets and other architectural parts for which marble or slab is commonly used. Petrified wood is said to be susceptible of a finer polish than marble or even onyx, the latter of which it is driving from the market. For All Who Die. The following poem was regarded by Edgar A. Poe as the most beautiful and touching ot its kind in tbe language: It hath been said for all who die There is a tear, Some paining, bleeding heart to sigh O’er every bbr; But in that hour of pain and dread Who will draw near Around my humble touch and shed One farewell tear. Who’ll watch the fast departing ray In deep despair, And soothe the spirit on its' way With holy prayer ? Wbat mournc round my couch will ConV In words of woe And follow me to my long home Solemn and slow ? When lying on my earthly bed" In icy sleep \ Who then by pure affection led H Will come and weep ? By the pale moon implant the rose Upon my breast And bid it cheer my dark repose. My lonely rest ? Could I but know when I am sleeping t Bow in Ihe ground One faithful heart would then be keeping Watch all around, As if some gem lay shrined beneath That cold sod’s gloom, 'Twould mitigate the pengs of death And light the tomb. Yes, in that hour if I could feel From the halls of glee And beauty’s pressure one would steal In secrecy And come and sit or stand by me In night’s deep noon. Oh, I would ask of memory No other boon. But ah, a lonelier fate is mine, A deeper woe. From all I've loved in youth’s sweet time I soon must go. Draw round me my pale robes of white In a dark spot To sleep thro’ death’s long, dreamless night, lame and forgot. HUMOROUS. The pretty girl who is maid of hall work is the door belle. A pound party—the young woman who is learning to play on the piano. A New Jersey man has been fined fifty dollars for. keeping a cow. The cow belonged to a neighbor. A “monster in human form” sayp that the only time a woman does not exaggerate is when she is talking of her own age. “Nothing is impossible for him who wills,” chimes in a would-be philo sopher. You don’t try it when the old lady says “won’t.” ne: “I see the latest luvaey'-el—_ women is to have a monkey for a pet.” She : “That is not new. It was so when we got married.” “Happy the man whose bride has many needle marks on her fingers." This doesn’t necessarily follow. Per haps she has just completed a crazy quilt. A thoughtful mind can find fodder for much rumination in the announce ment that seventy-two per cent of the baldheaded men of this country are married. The Use of Mosquitoes. There had been a discussion in the parlor car on the uselessness of mosqui toes. This particular parlor car was running through the State of Michi gan, where August mosquitoes are not noted either for their modesty or their smallness. After everybody else had A kind word may turn away wrath, but it won’t turn away a bull-dog when he is after a small boy, and the small boy is trying to escape with the contents of an orchard. A horticultural authority says “ there are 1,600 kind of pears.” It is the green pear, though, that is the doctor’s favorite. This is one of the thiDgs that science cannot alter. George Eliot says "things look dim to old folks.” They undoubtedly do when old folks peer into the parlor be tween the hours of nine and twelve in the evening. But the old folks look ominously distinct to the occupants of its dimness. A member of the rhetorical class in a certain college had just finished his declamation, when tho professor said ; "Mr. , do you suppose a general would address his soldier; in the man ner you spoke that piece? ’ “Yes, sir, I do,” was the reply, “if he was half- scared to death and as nervous as • cat.” A maiden’s lament: “Mother,” she said with hoart that beat Loud as her tones of woo, “To you the secret I’ll repeat This cold world cannot know. Lay thy hand on my throbbing brow— Nay_. shrink not from the theme— O-icnr has come lor two weeks now, And never said “ice cream V 9 v given his opi panied by express tous qu engaged oung g man accom- was invited to on the momen- young man was the face of the was so sweetly oulder, breathing instead of her nose, ant in his guard lighting upon the ne, evidently his own wifey, that his own ised to the as- |are of any yilh se- I The Loftiest Railroad. Mr. Meiggs carried his famous rail road from Lima to the crest of the Andes at a cost of #27,'100,000 and 7,000 human lives, but died before completing it About fifty miles ot track remain to be built A contract for its construction has been made by a brother of Mayor Grace, of New York. It is said that the sensation of riding up this railroad, together with the rapid ascent from tbe sea level to the mountain’s crest, produces a sick ness called “sirocebe,” often fatal, and usually sending people to bed for sev eral weeks. The symptons are a terri- - ble pressure upon the temples, nausea, ! bleeding at the nos9 and' ears and [ faintness, but the effects can be avoid ed by taking precautions and obseg ing r ules ] ed, the cj of!
