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Precision Precise!
I never saw a deeper, or more soul*
satisfying, heart-stirring, or apprecia
tive smile than was that which dwelt
upon tlio faces of the audience, and stole
out tremulously upon the air, ou a cer
tain occasion when lawyer Holden, of
Oxford County, Maine, was questioning
a certain Crooked River witness on a case
at law.
It was a very simple matter: A man
of Norway—a well-to-do farmer—in
passiug the dwelling of old Sam. Pin
gree, in a oue-horse wagon, lmd run over
and killed a small pig, Piljgree v*ns
boiling; and failing to obtain pay by
bluster, he resorted to Jaw, and instructed
Hidden to sue: and Holden did so.
The case came up before Justice Up
ton. Mnrston was the name of the de
fendant, and it very soon became evident
that everybody’s sympathy was with
him. Old I’ingree’s pigs, and cattle and
animals of all sorts, had been a nuisance
in the highway for years.
Amou£ Marstpu’s witnesses was'uncle
Tim Smith—good old soul—as honest as
the day is long—truthful and simple
hearted —albeit, a little inclined to tell
big stories of liis own exploits. Uncle
Tim had seen the whole thing—had seen
the pig ran, under the horse’s feet, com
ing very near to throwing Marston’s team
into a complete wreck. Holden took
this witness hi liaud to cross-examine
him.
“Now, see here, Mr, Smith: We
want none of your s’ posin’s —none of
your i/'s or bttts; but I want you to give
plain, straightforward answers to my
questions.—Now then! Give your at
tention; yon saw Mr. Marston—the de
fendant in this ease—driving his car
riage past,Mr. Pingree’s dwelling?”
, “ No, six-!’*
*‘ What! Did you not so declare under
oath?”
“No, Sir!”
‘"Whatr You did not see Mr. Mars
ton driving past Mr. Pingree’s dwell
ing?”
“ Yess—l did!"
“Your Honor!” exclaimed Holden,
turning to the Justice with tire in his
eye, and a thunder-cloud upon his
brow— i*
But Upton did not allow him to fin
ish.
“Confine yourself to the witness, Mr.
Holden. Evidently, he kuows wliat lie
is talking about.”
Then, iling with wrath, the peppery
iawyer returned to the witness, who
stood as calmly cool and serene as an
autumnal morning in harvest-time.
“ Witness! I will ask you once more:
Did-you not tell this court in your direct
testimony, that you stood near, and were
looking on, when Mr. Marston passed my
client’s house?”
“Yes, sir,—l did.”
“ And, now, sir, wliat was he driv
ing?”
“ He teas drivin' his hoss, sir."
Holden saw the point, and collapsed.
It was a tremendous pill for him to swal
low, but he had to do it.— New York
Ledger.
Bookbinding.
The bookbinders’ craft was at its
zenith just before the invention of
printing; it has waned since, because
nobody would care nowadays to give
such prices as were cheerfully paid for
books in the days when it took twenty
five months of a patient scribe’s work to
produce one copy of the Bible. The
bindings of such costly books were
works of art. Milan first, we are told,
acquired a reputation for its bindings of
Spanish leather, arabesqued and gilt,
which superseded the old-fashioned
bindings of wood, metal, or ivory ; but
until the close of the fifteenth century
the bindings of presentation volumes
and of church books used on the high
altars of cathedrals were mostly of solid
gold or silver. Bruges produced some
eautiful works of this description, like
wise bindings in cloth of gold wrought
with silk of many colors. At Ypres, the
treat cloth mart of North Europe, were
rst made plain bindings of cloth, em
broidered more or less; but these were
used only for small volumes of jests and
ballads, and for the horn books out of
which the children in noble families
learned their letters. Venice had a
name for its bindings in ivory and woods
from the East ; Florence, like Ghent in
Flanders, abounded in brass artificers,
and produced brazen bindings gilt or
silvered, each one the work of a master
craftsman, for none ventured to make
book-covers who were not skilled with
their tools ; but the most gorgeous bind
ings of all that were made before the
invention of printing came from Rome.
Here the guild of Italian goldsmiths had
its chief hall; and there was always a
sure sale for rich bindings of wrought
gold, seeing that the Kings and
potentates who came to visit the Papal
See invariably gave and received pres
ents of splendid books.
Queen Tic’s Wealth.
A preposterous paragraph has been
going on its rounds to the effect that
Queen Victoria had insured her life for a
large amount, in a Parisian office. In
asmuch as the Queen is sixty years old
she will have to pay a pretty heavy
Eremium. No details are given as to
er Majesty’s having undergone medical
scrutiny, and we are left to assume that
the company waived such a sordid con
sideration in the case of a regal client.
So far as the Queen is concerned any life
insurance would be an absurdity, in view
of her having been easily able, for many
years, to save $1,000,000 a year. She is
probably the wealtliiest woman in the
world. Putting aside all other source of
income, her Duchy of Lancaster, and
legacy from Mr. Neeld, bring her in
$300,000 a year, and her income alto
gether is probably nothing short of $3,-
000,000 a year. —New York Times.
“I wish I was worth $1,000,000,” said
a gentleman. “ What good would it do
you, for you don’t apend your present
income?” inquired a friend. “Oh, I
could be economical on a large scale.'’
SOUTHERN NEWS.
It rained 130 days in W’esLrn Texas
last year.
Italian laborers for orange groves have
arrived at Jacksonville, Fla
The colored Methodists of \\ aco, Tex.,
aie to erect a #7,000 college.
Judge A. J. Ross, of Salado, has been
elected Grand Master of the Texas State
Grange.
Philadelphia workmen are laying street
mains for the new water-works in Ma
con. Ga.
Meridian has shipped more cotton h>
this season than any other town in Mis
sissippi except Vicksburg.
Alabama has a provision in her con
stitution forbidding the consolidation ol
competing lines of telegraph.
No smoking will hereafter he allowed
in anv of the buildings of \ anderbilt
University. Nashville.
The voi ladies of Gretna. La., lm*e
organized ‘‘The Meddlers’ Social C lub.
Miss May Worley is President.
Maj. Gen. .T. M. Schofield, the new
commander of the military division of
the South, has arrived in New Orleans.
New and extensive coal mines are to
be opened this year on the line of the
South and North and the Alabama Great
Southern.
Between Irwinville and Hawkinsville,
Ga., seven or eight new settlements have
been made, fences put up, dwellings
erected, etc.
Mrs. Matilda Fields, of Gibson county.
Tenu., sixty years of age, is the daughter
of the celebrated Davy Crockett.
Atlanta, Ga., is a large horse and mule
market. The receipts since September
have been 14,548 horses and mules, 5,550
cattle, and 25,390 hogs.
The Tampa (Fla.) Tribune mentions a
report that the people in the eastern end
of Hillsborough county and in Polk are
becoming discouraged about the orange
business because of the lack of transpor
tation. , .
Out of 172,005 voters registered in
Louisiana, 85,451 are white, and of these
16,913 make their marks instead of wri
ting their names. The colored registra
tration is 88,024, and of these 11,403
write their names.
The Dismal Swamp canal, which con
nects Norfolk, (Va.) harbor with Albe
marle, (N. C.) sound, is of great impor
tance to Norfolk. The number of ves
sels that paased through it last year
included 341 steamers, 263 schooners, 94
sloops, 517 lighters, 24 boats and 50 rafts.
Total, 1,291. .
A mysterious pillar of smoke rises from
the midst of a morass in the southeastern
corner of Jefferson county, Fla. Before
the war it was attributed to runaway
negroes, during the war to deserters, and
since the war to illicit distillers. It is
said that a visible glow has often been
observed.
Atlanta Constitution: Capital may
not lie accumulated very rapidly in the
South, but it will be rolled together
fully as fast as the Northern mill-owners
will care to have it. The North can and
will manufacture a vast variety of
things, but i t cannot monopolize or long
contiol the manufacture of the great
Btaple of the South
In Tennessee there are about 1,250
convicts, about half of the number being
in the penitentiary and the remainder in
branch prisons. The branch prisons at
Battle Creek coal mines and at Sewanee
are woeden structures inclosed by wood
en palisades, and it is said that they have
proved superior in comfort, security and
healihfulnesß to the penitentiary itself
The size of the cotton factory at Pied
mont, S. C., has been more than doubled,
and it is now the largest faetory in one
building in the South. A correspondent
of the Charleston News and Courier says
that five years ago tHereTwls not a single
house at that place, and now there are
147, besides the factory building, which
is to support 1,500 people and house 12,-
000 bales of cotton a year.
Atlanta Constitution: The discovery
of the lost portfolio came very near
working a change in the list of States.
Georgia now has 1,542,071 people, and
Tennessee 1,542,463. If the enumerators
of Georgia had found 393 more people,
Georgia would have outranked Tennes
see, and retained her place as the twelfth
State. As the case stands, she is the
thirteenth State. Is there not another
lost portfolio?
The celebrated Dummitt orange grove,
the oldest and largest grove in East Flor
ida, situated between the Indian river
and the Atlantic, comprising 450 acres,
having 3,500 trees now in bearing, pro
ducing last year 4,000 boxes, has been
sold to the Duca Telia Castellucia, an
officer in the Italian military service.
The Duke and Duchess will make Jack
gonvillo their winter home. The Duke
proposes to have skilled laborers brought
from his groves in Sicily.
F. B Ferguson writes from the United
States l-'ish Commission to Gen. Chal
mers, of Mississippi, that the charges by
the boats on the Mississippi are practi
cally a bar to the continuance of the dis
tribution in Chalmers’ Congressional
district. He says: “In all other sec.
tions of the country railroads and boats
make no charge for the cans of fish, hut
on the Mississippi river they not only
charg' and very high rates for the cans, hut
in some eases, especially at Fort Adams,
wharfage for loading and reshipping the
empty cans was charged.”
The New Orleans Chamber of Com*
inert? has appointed a committee of five
persons to correspond or confer with the
Postmaster General upon the following
proposition: That lit- shall invite the
several railroad corporations connecting
New Orleans with the cities of St. Louis.
Milwaukee, Chicago, Cincinnati, Louis
ville, Richmond. Baltimore, Washing
ton, Philadelphia and New York, to con
sider the expediency of placing ou their
joint account a semi-monthly line of ocean
steamers connecting the port of Aspin
wa 11, Central America, with the port of
New Orleans, receiving as a contribution
by the United States, the sea postage to
accrue upon such route, with such other
appropriations as Congress may be in
duced to make for that purpose.
St . Lon Is vs. Detroit.
One would not think that there was
such a difference between the people of
St. Louis and the people of Detroit in
the matter of committing suicide. In
St. Louis when a young woman lias
made up her mind that life is a burden
too heavy to be longer borne she sits down
and writes a dying lament to three differ
ent daily papers. Then she writes a let
ter to the Coroner and tells him to buy a
S2OO lot to bury her body in, erect a SSOO
stone in her memory, aud to select a jury
of poets and clergymen to view her re
mains. Then she dresses in her best
aud starts for the river. It is always a
wild night. She always reached a wharf
boat without being seen. Her wild,
despairing cry as she leaps into the
murky river always floats to heaven on
the shrieking gale, and when the body is
found a smile of angelic sweetness is
playing around her mouth.
How different such things are in .De
troit! The young women write no
poetry, and have no thought of the Cor
oner. They care not for a burial lot
centrally situated nor a monument with
a cherub to crown it. They never go out
to commit suicide on a wild night, as it
might spoil their clothes. Someone
always sees them as they go down to the
river. They never say anything but
“Oh!” when they jump. There are
always a dozen meu ou hand to pull them
out, wring them dry, furnish them with
a class of cheap lager, aud send them
homo with the warning:
“Now, gal, if you come fooling around
with your drinking water any more we’ll
have yon sent up for six months!”
There isn’t any romance here in De
troit. Everything is a cold, stern reali
ty, and our greatest poets and sentiment
alists give their personal attention to
buying the family cabbages. —Detroit
Free Press.
Tile Upper and Lower Eyes
“There are two pairs of ey-'s in man,
and it is requisite that the pair which
are beneath should bo closed when the
pair that are above them perceive, and
that when the pair above are closed,
those which are beneath are opened.”
The lower eyes see only the surfaces and
effects, the upper eyes behold causes
and the connection of things. And when
we go alone or come into the house of
thought and worship, we come with pur
pose to be disabused of appearances, to
see realities, the great lines of our des
tiny, to see that life has no caprice or
fortune, is no hopping squib, but a
growth after immutable laws, under
beneficent influences the most immense.
The church is open to great and small
in all nations, and how rare and lofty,
how unattainable, are the aims it labors
to set before men! We come to educate,
come to isolate, to be abstractionists;
in fine, to open the upper eyes to the
deep mystery of cause and effect, to
know that, though ministers of justice
and power fail, Justice and Power fail
never. The open secret of the world is
the art of subliming a private soul with
inspirations from the great and public
and divine Soul from which we five.—
Emerson.
A Colored Beau Brummel.
There was a ball the other night that
was attended by the elite of the colored
aristocracy of Galveston. Jim Webster,
who is of very light complexion, and
rather proud of it, was there. He invit
ed one of the colored ladies, who is
blacker than the ace of spades, to dance,
but she put on immense airs because he
didn’t wear gloves, fearing he might soil
her dress with his hands.
“Look heah, Bukey,” said Jim, “ef
yer didn’t wash yerself fore you corned
here I don’t want to swing corners wid
you, nohow. I don’t want to hab ter
use a scrubbin’ brush on my liana ebery
time I slings one ob dose black heifers
around.”
A statistician, who claims to have
made accurate calculation, declares that
the pine forests of Michigan will be ex
hausted in thirteen years, and those of
Wisconsin and Minnesota in thirty or
forty years. Twenty years ago this
region had scarcely been touched by the
ax.
Something Abont Babies.
According to a Yorkshire notion, anew
bom infant should Joe laid first in the
arms of a maiden before anyone touches
it: and in some places the infant’s right
hand is left unwashed in order that he
may gather riches. It is, too, considered
very inqiortaufc l>y many that an infant
should go up in the world Indore it goes
down. Thus, in Cleveland, says Mr.
Henderson, if a child should ho l>oru in
the top story of a house, for waut, of a
flight of stairs one of the gossips will
take it in her arms and mount a table,
chair, or chest of drawers before she
carries it down-stairs.
In the north of England, when an in
fant for the first time goes out of the
house, it is presented with an egg, some
salt and a little loaf of bread, and occa
sionally a small piece of money—these
gifts being supposed to iusure that the
child shall never stand in need of the
common necessaries of lifo. In the
East Riding of Yorkshire a few matches
are added to light the child to heaven.
It was, too, in former times, customary,
and the practice is not yet obsolete, to
provide a large cheese and cake, and cut
them at the birth of the child. These
were called “the groaning cake and
cheese,” and were distributed among all
the neighbors.
In Yorkshire this cake is termed the
“pepper cake,” and in some localities
the “sickening cake." It is the source
of a species of divination, for being cut
into small pieces by the medical man. it
is divided among the unmarried of the
female sex, under the name of “dream
ing bread.” Each one takes a piece,
places it in the foot of the left stocking,
and throws it over the left shoulder.
This laving done, they must retire to bed
backward, without uttering a word, and
those who are lucky enough to fall
asleep before midnight are favored with
a sight of their future husband in Iheir
dreams.
Inventions of Women.
The list of woman’s inventions of recent
date is by no means blank. One of the
best machines now in use for the manu
facture of paper bags is the invention of
Mary E. Knight, of Springfield, Mass.
The accomplished wife of Father Hya
cintlie holds a patent for an improved
corset. The Empress Eugenio invented
the many flounced bustle—the procursor
of the extinct crinoline. Mrs. Walton
has devised a way of deadening the noise
on the elevated railroads, and a spark ar
rester for locomotives. Women obtain
from the Governmental! average of about
sixty patents yearly. During the year
ending July, 1880, women received some
seventy patents, a list of the subjects,
which is appended, as a useful showing
of the tendency of the inventive faculties
of the sex. As might be expected, the
plurality of articles relate to the lighten
ing of women’s work. Among them are
a jar-lifter, a bag-holder, a pillow-sham
holder, a dress protector, two dust-pans,
a washing machine, a fluting iron, a dress
chart, a fish-boner, a sleeve-adjuster, a
lap table, a seaniing-miic.hi.utj treadle, a
wash basin, au iron heater, sad-irons, a
garment stiffener, a foldingchair, award
rol>e bed, a window-cleaner, a napkin, a
clothespin, a weather-strip, a churn, au
invalid’s bed, a strainer, a milk-cooler,
a sofa-bed, a dipper, a paper dish, and a
plaiting device. In the line of purely
mechanical contrivances appear a car
step, a baggage attachment for vehicles,
a shoe-channeling machine, a guard for
sleeping berths, a loom for tubular fab
rics, a window frame, an oil burner, a
life-raft, a window-fastener, a locomo
tive’s chimney, a buckle, paper bag ma
chines, dumping-wagon and a bale-tie.
Besides these are braces, corsets, a hat
cover, a collar, a doll supporter, a shawl
strap, corset-clasps, undergarment*, a
game, a shoe aud a hair-wash.
What a Boy Knows About Girl*.
Girls are the most imacoountableat
things in the world—except woman.
Like the wicked flea, when you havo
them they ain’t there. I can cipher
clean over the improper transactions,
and the teacher says Ido first rate; but
I can’t cipher ont a girl, proper or im
proper, and you can’t either. The only
rule in the arithmetic; that hits their
cases is the double rulo of three. They
are as full of Old Nick as their skins can
hold, and they would die if they could
not torment somebody. When they try
to be mean, they are as mean as pusly
though they ain’t as mean as they let on,
except sometimes, and then they are a
good-deal meaner. The only way to get
along with a girl when she comes to you
with her nonsense is to give her tat for
tat, and that will flumranx her and when
you get a girl flummnxed she is us nice
as a pin." A girl can sow more wild oats
than a boy can sow in a year, but gills
get their wild oats sowed after a while,
which boys never do, and then they set
tle down as calm and as placid as a mud
puddle. But I like the girls first rate,
and I guess all the boys do. I don’t
care how many tricks they play on me—
and they don’t care either. The hoity
toityest girl in the world can always boil
over like a glass of soda. By and by
they get into the traces with somebody
they like, and pull as steady as an old
stage horse. That is the beauty of them.
So, let them wave, I say; they will pay
for them some day, sewing on buttons
and trying to make a man out of the fel
low they have spliced to and ten chances
to one if they don't get the worst of it.
f |f)on’t Spell if Out.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton is trying to
persuade her friends to write their own
full names, as if the public cared for any
thing but some distinguishing initial.
As remarks the Boston Transcript, “it
does not improve a piece of bad poetry
to have it signed Marv Ann James Pat
terson Perkins, nor does any one care to
!>o reminded that Mrs. Charles Smith’s
maiden name was Polly Snow, by her
writing Polly Snow Smith, whenever she
has an opportunity.”
Familiar Quotation*.
The expression “ a dim religion*
light” may l>o found in Milton’s “ Pen*
seroso," and the oommonly-repeated saw
that “ absence makes the heart grow
fonder ”is to be discovered in T. H.
Bavley’s song, “Isle of Beauty."
Colley Cibber, as almost every one is
aware, took it into his head that he
could greatly improve upon Slmkspearo’s
tragedy “ King Richard HI,;” and, in
pursuance of this idea, he made various
.ulditions to the play, many of which
have, curiously enough, entered, ns it
were, into the language. Among these
we may notice, “So much for Bucking
ham “ Richard’s himself again,” and
“My soul’s in arms aiul eager for the
fray hut, in spite of them, Mr. Cib
ber’s tinkering, though gratefully
adopted by more than ouo great actor,
lias now fallen into well-merited disre
pute. In criticising Lord Beacousfield’s
speeches, hostile papers are fond of
making effective reference to “apt allit
eration's artful aid,” but they seldom, if
indeed ever, allow Churchill, the satirist,
any credit for the phrase. Mr. O’Con
nor, too. If wo remember rightly, has
written of the gay Conservative states
man as “the gay Lothario of politics.”
How many persons, we wonder, recol
lect that the original “gay Lothario” is
one of the characters in Rowe’s tragedy,
“The Penitent?” Then, again, tv a
phrase “comjMirisous are odious” ts
almost invariably written without quo
tation marks. It occurs in Burton's
“Anatomy of Melancholy,” aud also
in Herbert’s “Jacula Prudentnm,”
aud Shakspeare, in “Much Ado
About Nothing," says “comparisons
are odorous.” A literary journal of
some standing recently made itself a
laughing stock by remarking that this
last was not classical English—a qnito
suttioient proof that even lie whom Ben
Jonson called “sweet swan of Avon” is
not as well known as he ought to be.
The origin of the term "the midnight
oil ” is hard to trace, but it occurs iu
Quarles, iu Hhenstone and in Gay, and
it was probably invented by the first.
“Devil take the hindermost” opens up
another difficult problem ; lmt perhaps
Beaumont and Fletcher may claim the
phrase, which was used iu later days by
Butler, Prior, Pope, Burns and half a
dozen more. “ Diamond cut diamond”
is traceable to Ford’s “Lover’s Mclau
clioly,” where it may be found in the
form “diamonds cut diamonds," nnd
the expression, “ neither fish nor flesh
nor good red herring" seems to belong
to Sir H. Sheers. “Turnover anew
leaf” says Middleton, in “Anything for
a Quiet Life,” and it was Mrs. Malu
prop, in Sheridan’s “The Rivals,” who
first owned “the soft impeachment.”
Oliver Goldsmith, iu “The Good-na
tured Man,” wrote “ measures, not men,
have always been my mark;” and
Burke, doubtless alluding to the popu
larity of the phrase in his day, spoke o!
“ the cant of • not men, but measuros.' ”
To Milton we owe the saying that
PeacA bath her victories
No lo renowned than war;
and it was Goldsmith again who, iu
“She Stoops to Conquer,” introduced
us to “the very pink of perfection.”—
London Queen.
1 Fresh Air in the Bed-Room.
How much air can be safely admitted
into a sleeping or living-room is a com
mon question. Rather, it should le
considered how rapidly air can bo ad
mttted without injury or risk, and at
how low a temperature. We cannot
have too much fresh air, so long as we
are warm enough and not exposed to
draughts. What is a draught? It is a
swift current of air at a temperature lower
than the body, which robs either the
whole body, or an exposed part, of its
heat so rapidly as to disturb the equi
librium of our circubition and give us
cold. Young and healthy persons can'
habituate themselves to sleeping in even
a strong draught, as from an open win
dow, if they cover themselves in .cold
weather with an abundance of bed
clothes, But thoso who have been Wtg
accustomed to beiug sheltered from tlio
outer air by sleeping in warmed and
nearly or quite shut-up rooms, are too
susceptible to oold to bear a direct
draught of cold air. Persons over 7G
years of age, moreover, with lower vi
tality than in their youth, will not bear
a low temperature, even in the air they
breathe. Like hot-house plants, thev
may be killed by a winter night’s chill,
and must he protected by warmth at all
times. Asa rule, we may say that, ex
cept for the most robust, the air which
enters at night into a sleeping chamber
should, in cold weather, be admitted
gradually only by cracks or moderate
openings; or should have its force broken
by some interposing olxttacle ; as a cur
tain, etc., to avert it# blowing imme
diately upon a sleeper in his bed. The
ancient fashion, however, of haviug bed
curtains, which exclude almost all the
air, has rightly become almost obsolete.
No wonder that people dream horrid
dreams, and wake iu the morning
wearied rather thun refreshed, when
they sleen in rooms sealed up tightly on
every side, breathing over and over
again their own breaths, which grow
more poisonous in every hour of the
uiithi.—American Health Primer.
When to Take a Bath.
There is no practice more objectiona
ble than to go to lied closely wrapped
up in the dust and dirt that accumulate
on the surface of the laxly during the
day ; nor is there anything so conducive
to sound sleep as a tepid douche just be
fore getting into lied. Many bad sleep
ers liecome the best of sleepers from the
adoption of this simple rule.
Corn Mush.— When the water in
tended for mush begin# to boil, salt, sift
in the meal with one hand, stirring with
the other to prevent lumps. When
thick, set the kettle into the oven and
let it bake an hour. This cooks the
meal thoroughly without danger of burn
ing.