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THE,
TLANTA SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, ATLANTA, GA., FRIDAY, JANUARY 17, 1913.
THE SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL
ATLANTA, GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST.
Kntered at the Atlanta Postoffice as Mail Matter of
the Second Class.
JAMES R. GRAY,
President, and Editor.
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Atlanta, Ga.
How would you like to be a mule’s chiropodist?
In one case, at least, the recall of judges seemed
to work quite well.
Well, it didn’t snow, but the weather man has
plenty of time yet to make good.
Georgia Rivers and Harbors.
The national rlvers-and-harhors bill, which is
soon to be reported to the House, is said to pro
vide nearly a million dollars for improvements in
Georgia. That is a cheering prospect for scores of
communities and a significant one to all who have
glimpsed the far-reaching possibilities of the
State’s waterways and ports.
The rivers of Georgia have thus far played com
paratively a small part in its commercial life. But
with due development and enterprise, they can he
turned to fruitful account and made a quickening
force for common business interests. Of recent
years, the State’s the State’s water-power sites have
begun to attract discerning notice; and when they
have been surveyed and mapped with a view to
prudent conservation, their immense resources will
no doubt be developed and 'become a new agency
for industrial progress. Likewise, the rivers will
be utilized as highways for traffic when they are
properly developed and will become, as they can'
and should be, a benefit to the people.
It is gratifying to note that the bill soon to he
submitted to Congress calls for several substantial
appropriations to thte end. For the Chattahoochee
Uluiisai# dollars has been alloted;
for the Coosa, ninety tnousand; for the Oconee,
Ocmulgee and Altamaha, forty thousand; for the
Flint, fifteen thousand; and for the Savannah to
Fernandina waterway, one hundred thousand. In
some instances, to be cure, the sum proposed is far
from adequate to existing needs; but the Georgia
share of the national appropriation considered as a
whole, is distinctly heartening.
Of chief importance is the fact that the .'Com
mittee will recommend four hundred and seventy-
five thousand dollars for the Savannah river and
harbor and thirty-three thousand dollars for the
Brunswick harbor. The inland cities of Georgia
should not forget that the ports at Savannah and
Brunswick are a rich asset to the entire State or,
that the development of these ports will, in one way
or another, benefit the commonwealth as a whole.
All Georgians, regaraless of where they may re
side or of what their individua’ interests may he,
have cause for keen satisfaction over the promised
improvement for the State’s harbors and rivers.
Money }a easy again, hut it still talks just as
noisily.
All the gambling houses have been closed at Hot
Springs, and yet some people can’t see that reform
is in the air.
The Archbold Conviction.
The impeachment and conviction of Judge Rob
ert W. Archbald, of the Commerce Court, is note
worthy for the thoroughness of his trial and also
for the fact that he Is one of the only three mem
bers of the Federa- judiciary who have *,een found
guilty of malfeasance in office since the nation be
gan.
His case shows that the means provided by the
Constitution for the removal ot a corrupt judge
are adequate. The -record shows that such judges
have been exceedingly rare on the Federal bench.
After a full and fair Investigation, the House
of Representatives voted almost unanimously for
Judge Archbald’s impeachment and the charges
were presented to the Senate. The inquiry in the
House began on May the seventh and within two
months the case was formally before the Senate.
Owing to the press of legislation, the trial was de
ferred until December, but when all the circum
stances are home in mind, It seems to have been
expeditious and, certa'.ily, it was thoroughgoing.
So long as officials who abuse their office and
power can thus bo called to a reckoning and to
punishment, there is no cause to distrust the meth
ods now provided for that purpose py the Constitu
tion.
It is perhaps a human Impossibility to devise any
system of government in which had men or weak
men will not occasionally find offices of which they
are unworthy or for which they are incompetent.
But it is a remarkable tribute to the uprightness
of our Federal courts that only three of their judges
have been impeached and convicted since the Con
stitution was adopted, it has been fifty years since
I bore was a case like that of Archbald and fifty-nine
i-s elapsed uetween the first and the second case
President-elect Wilson has a way of hitting the
nail on the head at the psychological moment, for in
stance when he says the reactionary will be barred.
The Balkan Bayonet.
The London Peace Conference, which has been
moving in tedious circles now promise^ to break off
at a sharp, dramatic tangent. The larger Powers, as
well as the Balkan States, have reached the frazzled
limit of their patience over the Turks’ continued
delays. Unless present plans miscarry a note of the
Powers will be presented to the Porte on Thursday,
counseling the surrender of Aarianople and advising
that the final disposition of the Aegean islands
be left to international settlement. At the same
time, the Balkan allies will terminate the armistice
and unless Turkey responds as they desire, will
renew the war.
In the latter even" there seems little doubt as to
what the result would be for the Ottoman govern
ment. When the truce was established early in De
cember, the Allies enjoyed great strategic advantage.
They had beaten the main Turkish hrmy into a pell-
mell retreat toward Constantinople and in divers
ways had outgeneralied aud outfought the Sultan’s
forces. The interim of peace has, on the jvhole,
strengthened their military status and has given
them time for recuperation. Most importan. of all,
they are as stanchly united in their common inter
ests as ever and they are even now determined.
The Turks, on the contrary are as weak and as
demoralized as they were before the armistice was
perfected. Political dissension is still rife at home.
Their domestic problems are as grave as ever. As
for Adrlanoplte, which is the center of dispute, that
city is reported to be in the' clutch of danger and
disease—far more formidable besiegers than any
hostile army could ever he.
Will the Turks reconcile themselves to the loss
of Adrianople through means of peace and at the
suggestion of Europ", or will they continue thei.-
obstinancy until the city topples under the enemy’s
bayonets?
A few more days will furnish the answer It
would seem that the instinct of self-preservation
should lead the Ottoman government to adopt the
peaceful course. Otherwise it can scarcely hope
to hold itself intact.
In any event, it seems that the day of reckon
ing for European Turkey is at hand. By some
means or other, the *rip of an uncivilized tyranny
over lands that should be free to prosper and prog
ress, will be broken.
And a lazy man can’t because he won’t.
Science tunnels mountains while faith is figuring
on moving them.
Of course your way of earning a living is the
hardest way there is.
Any thin i woman can get plump with the right
kind of a dressmaker.
O, Ye of Little Faith.
Even in this golden age, when the world is re
turning to its early faith in goblins and fairies and
a thousand wonders never dreamt of in dull philoso
phy, there are Gracgrind skeptics who refuse to
believe anything they cannot verify in their own
routine experience. They continue to doubt that
Jonah traveled in the whale, that Orpheus > rode to
safety on a dolphin’s back, and some of them are
so profane as to doubt that Tom Thumb himself
was swallowed by a trout and then delivered safe
and sound to the kitchen table at the palace of his
king. Even though such marvels did occur in the
dim long-ago, say our skeptics, they never could
happen again.
To all such carping souls, we commend that
story, fresh from the news "df the day, which relates
the strange adventure of a ruby ring owned by Mr.
Henry Gold, a matter-of-fact citizen of Bayonne, New
Jersey. We doubt that Mr. Gold, fanciful though
his cognomen, reads fairy tales or holds secret com-
verse with the gnomes of the night. He is simply
an average, trousered American; wherefore his ex
perience, or rather that of his jewel, is all the more
interesting and credible.
Last week, he went a-fishing. In the midst of
his sport he dropped his ring overboard. It was a
grievous loss, for the stone was an heirloom, and he
could not he reconciled. A few mornings later,
however, he entered his office in high spirits, dis
playing the ring to his astonished associates. “Why,
how did you get it back!” they exclaimed. Then he
made the mystery clear. On the evening before, he
had received by parcel post a fine fish sent by the
friend with whom he had gone angling. His wife
prepared the fish for supper and there inside it lay
the ring.
Where now, agnostics, is your ground for doubt
over Jonah and Tom Thumb?
There’s always a chance for a man to become
famous if he isn’t a dead one.
The cunning of a fox isn’t in it with the cun
ning of a young widow who is in love.
Mrs. H. C. White.
The death of Mrs. H. C. White, of Athens, is a
grievous loss to the State and a poignant sorrow to
the hundreds' of people who had the fortune and
the blessing of her personal .friendship.
Her life was luminous with the goodness and
the .grace that make true womanhood a guiding and
healing power in the world. Her spirit was one that
kept pace with the march of large ideas and philan
thropies and yet was ever ready with helpfulness
and cheer for the homeliest needs and the humblest
lives.
As president of the Georgia Federation of Wom
en’s Clubs she rendered service that will count for
long years to come not only in the strength and
usefulness of that organization but also in the social
happiness and betterment of the commonwealth.
Every movement that had for its purpose the bright
ening or enrichment oi the home received her gen
erous sympathy and her valuable support.
Gifted with the finest intuitions and with liberal
culture, she gave hers: If freely to her generation and
left a memory that will linger as a fragrant influ
ence and a benediction.
Many a girl who starts out to make a name for
herself can’t make a loaf of bread.
Lightning may not hit twice in the samo place,
but it is different with the chronic borrower.
w
1
Things That Happen
]
i
When I’m Not There
f
*
BY DR. FRANK CRANE
*
I am often worried by the thought o2 things going
on, where I once was, just th e same as when I was
there. Have you never felt this, just a little sickening
sensation, the revelation of the
truth that after all you do not
much matter?
You have moved. In your na
tive town you were somewhat.
Things depended upon ^ i. You
were consulted. \s -en you
couldn’t attend a meeting busi
ness was postponed. Somehow
you realized that you were a prop,
a pillar; yet, when you left, noth
ing tumbled. It is a hit disquiet
ing to know that the old /.lace is
getting along quite as well with
out you.
There is a little cafe in Paris,
in the Rue Saint Jacques, where
I used to take breakfast. It was
kept by a huge Provencal, with a
busy, cheerful roly-Provencai,
with a nice little nine-year-old daughter. Every morn
ing they greeted me as if the place would not have
been able to do business without /me. I was part of
• that menage. Now I am gone. They are doubtless
going forward with their lives stoutly and jovially,
French fashion. They miss me as the pond misses the
rain water of yesterday.
I was in Rome awhile. Now Roman affairs pro
ceed, cabs roll th e street, priests say early mass and
kneeling women are scattered in the churches, bakers’
boys go about with their baskets of bread upon their
heads, dandies loaf and ogle in front of the restaurant
Faraglia, and th e flower sellers by the Spanish Stairs
are busy, and I am not there.
Think of this when you are disposeu to feel your
importance. The spot light is upon you. You are the
headliner. Your position is It. But whether you are
in a railway company, a church, a lodge, a senate, an
army, or a social circle, cheer up! for when you drop
out the chorus of the mocking fates may be heard
merrily intoning the comic opera theme:
He never will be missed,
He never will be missed.
But it is not to indulge in lukewarm sentiment that
I indite these lines. It is rather to record my convic
tion that man is by nature and instinct an omnipresent
spirit; and th© fact that anything can happen when he
is not there, he feels to be a real grievance. That is
why we travel. We want to be pysent once, anyhow,
at the pyramids, the Taj Mahal, and the Yosemite;
really, we feel we should be there, and everywhere
else, all the time. Unfortunately our presence is
limited to the spot where the body happens to be.
The worst thing to me about dying is not the pain
nor the hereafter, 'but the thought that this great
world will go rumbling and roaring on just as if I had
never been. A man’s deepest treasure is his personal
ity. The deepest insult you can give him is to make
him feel that he makes no difference. The crudest
conviction that can enter his soul is that he is negligi
ble. j
Away down in my feelings I am hurt to think that
anything whatever can take place without me.
Perhaps this is egotism. Perhaps it is the begin
nings of the instinct of omnipresence, which in the
nest life, in a measure at least, may be realized.
College Co-operation
(New York Evening Mail.)
Gratifying evidence of the dying out of the old id^a
that universities must stoutly compete with each other
is found in the annual report of the president of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in discussing
the future relations of the institute and Harvard. The
time for a close physical and administrative union
passed with the purchase of the new site for the in
stitute, if, indeed, it had not passed before. But now
that these two great institutions are soon to be within
a few minutes’ ride of one another, the question of an
exchange of facilities and of the use of special equip
ment possessed by the one or the other is thrust to the
front. Mr. Maclaurin discusses it with admirable good
sense, suggesting that there is no reason whatever
why technology students should not profit by trie in
spiration of exceptionally able teachers at Harvard,
and vice versa. The beginning of such relations, he
thinks, should first be through the interchange of
graduate students. In the matter of physical equip
ment, the case is still plainer. President Maclaurin
points out that the institute may soon build an exper
imental tank for its department of naval architecture.
Why should not Harvard have the use of it? It would
surely be a great wast© for Harvard to build such a
tank, but ten minutes away. Again, the Technology
is to have the best mining and metallurgical laborato
ries in exfstence. Harvard ought to profit by them
precisely as the Technology should be able to use,
under proper restrictions, those great university mu
seums at Harvard which could only be duplicated, if
at all, by tremendous expenditure. Harvard, we are
cure, will be ready to meet the Technology half way;
and this friendly co-operation ought to be a valuable
example to the whol e college world.
Saving and Investing Talks
Don’t Keep Checks Undeposited.
BY JOHN M. OSKISON.
I onced worked in the same office with a man who
w on the way to becoming a miser. One day he
asked me for a small loan, explaining that he needed
the money because he had not
cashed any of the checks he
g( r eve*y vefk ir payment f>*
his work. I expressed sur
prise, and then he took from
his pocket a sheaf of checks
running back nearly six
months. He could not see tha
h •, was doing a foolish thing
to carry them around in his
pf cket.
Not long ago I found in a
newspaper this item of Wash
ington gossip;
“A government regulation
may make the bulk of the sav
ings of eighty-year-old Mrs.
Katherine Coombs so much waste paper. The aged
woman for thirty years has hoarded the monthly $10
voucher she received for her care of machine covers in
the bureau of engraving and printing. Today, her
trunk contains 360 of the warrants, calling for $3,600
from the treasury. But a treasury regulation provides
that such vouchers must be cashed within two years of
the date of issue.”
If you think that examples like these are rare you
are mistaken. The dark ages of personal finance have
not passed. There are a great man thousands of per
sons in this country who will not accept checks at all,
and a great many more who do not know what interest
is. To such, enlightenment will come slowly.
Meanwhile, it is a good rule to paste up in front of
you never to hold a check over night if you can possi
bly get it on deposit and on the way to collection the
day you receive it. By doing this you will make more
sure of getting the amount of the check placed to your
credit, and at the same time help the giver of the
check in keeping his accounts straight.
Be modern—use checks. Find out exactly what they
stand for. Learn about certified checks and drafts.
The powers that be are frank enough under the
direct, fearless probe encouraged by Wilson.
If a man is always making new friends it’s gen
erally a sign that his old friends are onto him,
^OUAITRY
TlMELTf
4 jQME topics
CCKDOCrED . BTJTRS. \T. HJTtLTOrt
UJJKEKAL LEE’S BIRTHDAY.
When this paper goes to press we will be almost
ready to celebrate General Robert E. Lee’s birthday,
which our legistlators made* a state holiday several
years ago. I find the 19th of January this year falls
on Sunday, and I do not know a better day than Sun
day to discuss the life of General Le© in the best of
our churches.
He was a fine specimen of a Virginia gentleman.
He had illustrious and patriotic ancestors, and he il
lustrated in his own life the virtues and graces of a
noble patriot. He was likewise a Christian gentleman,
a believer in the Christian religion. He was a splendid
father to his own children. \ A letter is extant where
he counselled with a school boy son that is equal to
or better than any that the famous Chesterfield ever
penned. He was about to leave his Arlington home,
just before the war, to go out on the frontiers of Texas
and New Mexico, to be absent a long time with his
military command, and this was his parting letter to
his absent son off at school. It was a model letter. It
should be read to school boys on every recurrence of
the Lee holiday.
He was a rich man, an extensive planter before the
war. The United States government' confiscated his
Arlington property, although it came to him through
his wife, who was a near relative of General Washing
ton’s Wife, once the widow Custis.
He had but little left when the Confederacy col
lapsed. He lived in a rented house in Richmond, and
his sole opportunity after the surrender was to teach
in a boys’ college in Virginia. He died within a few
years after the war closed, and spent his time in that
institution until his dem.se. He was appealed to time
anu again to allow the use of his name to head va
rious organizations or enterprises to make money by
soliciting from southern people.
He invariably refused to allow his name thus used.
He was particularly pressed to be named as head of
an insurance company, to urge old soldiers to buy in
surance. He modestly desisted until he was told that
he would only be expected to allow his name at the
head and draw a salary of $10,000 per annum.
Then he understood its purpose, and with a crimson
flush on his face, he said, with emphasis: “It is use
less to urge me. I shall never sell the use of my
name to any such scheme or combination.”
It will be remembered that Generals Early and
Beauregard did head the Louisiana lottery scheme for
a number of rs, and one or two noted Confederate
officers headed an insurance organization in which un
told thousands were lost in the southern states after
the war.
The keynote of general Lee’s character was un
blemished personal integrity. Nothing was allowed to
tinge that self-respect or tarnish his gocrtl name. Money
did not tempt him. With a large family left dependent
after the war closed, he faced poverty and privation
like a true-hearted Christian soldier. His good friend,
General Ewell, who desired to aid him, proposed to en
dow a chair in General Lee’s college, provided General
Lee would be given the annuity. He declined to take
it; said he wr.s getting along well in his position and
he hoped that money could be used to aid poverty-
stricken Confederate veterans. A home was built at
i-ie institution by the efforts of his Virginia friends,
and he was asked to accept it, but he declined with
gentle courtesy. It was then offered to his wife, and
she also declined, giving the same identical reasons.
It was turned over to the university as a president’s
home. Mrs. R. E. Lee died in the home, an inmate of
the family of her son, the president, who was promoted
to his father’s position after General Lee’s death, as
the head of the institution.
General Lee was a magnificent soldier before the
war. It has been said that General Winfield Scott
earnestly desired he should be his (3cott’s) successor
as general of the United States army.
It was a great trial to General Lee when he sun
dered his connection with the Federal army. He did
not resign until Virginia seceded. Then he said ne
‘‘never could draw a sword against his beloved state
and his kindred.” I have often wished that General
Lee could have lived longer, to have counselled the
Confederate states in the years that succeeded the
war. He was always so practical arid conservative
in his military life that „his counsel would have been
great and gracious in the tifhes.that followed the sur
render.
With his two great army lieutenants, General Stone
wall Jackson and General Longstreet, he was nearly
invincible as a general, and he failed btecause the task
was too great and the difficulties insurmountable.
General Lee’s name, his character and his patriotism
will ever increase in interest to the American people.
BURYING THE DEAL.
Forty-odd years ago, Hawthorne in his notes on
French and Italian travel, mentioned the horrible prac
tices among the modern Romans with their dead,
wher e they were stripped of all funeral attire, put into
rudest wooden coffins and thrown into a trench where
promiscuous corpses were thrown.
Said he: ‘‘This is the fate of all except thos e whose
friends choose to pay an exorbitant sum to have them
buried under the pavement of a church. The Italians
have an excessive dread of corpses and never meddle
with even those of their nearest and dearest relatives.
On the whole, perhaps the ancient practice of burning
the corpse is a preferable one, for nature has made it
difficult to do anything pleasant or satisfactory to a
dead body.” At the time those words were written by
this American author cremation was not talked of in
the United States. It is now a very common occur
rence to cremate dead bodies.
Where there is a crowded population the question
of disposing of dead bodies becomes a very serious
problem to the living, and cremation seems to be the
only solution of this difficulty, where the living may
be seriously and fatally affected by contaminating the
water supply, or where the atmosphere can be tainted
by the escaping gases that arise from decay and putre
faction.
In rural districts and sparsely settled localities it Is
a matter of small moment, where graves are well dug
in the earth, and one at a time, with perhaps weeks of
intermission, but where deaths are frequent and espe
cially where epidemics prevail, the burial question
will often force itself on thinking minds.
It was left to me some few years ago to remove
the coffins from our old family burying ground to the
public cemetery. I found very little to remove except
empty coffins, and those were only metallic ones that
had withstood complete decay. After a lapse of sixty
years there was not a single trace to be found. Within
fifty years there were few traces, and we may console
ourselves that underground things will disappear very
quickly.
It is the Bible decree: ‘‘Dust thou art; to dust thou
wilt return,” and cremation into ashes is a little
quicker than the dust and final disappearance in the
usual way.
Four U. S. Senators
Are Native Georgians
Atlanta, Ga., Jan. 13, 1913.
Editor The Journal:
A few days ago you stated in your news columns
that the appointment of Colonel Johnson to the
United States senate from Texas gave Georgia three
senators, Colonel Johnson having been born in this
state. According to that, Georgia has four senators.
Senator Duncan U. Fletcher, of Florida, is a native of
Geogia, having been born in Sumter county, January
6, 1859; moved the following year to Monroe county,
where he resided" till 1881, when he moved to Florida.
Hi attended the country schools of Monroe and later
attended Gordon institue at Barnesville.
STILES A MARTIN,
Sou then Press Clipping Bureau. Atlanta.
V
Needles and Pins
BY FREDERIC J. HASKINS
From time Immemorial these small instruments or j
trouble to the married man have played an important I
part in the evolution of human civilization. Civiliza- j
tion cannot exist among urr
clothed human beings, and j
clothing cannot be produced 1
withrut needles to sew it. Con- j
sequently, the use of the needle ,
dates back to the stone age \
when it took the form of a
hooked bone by means of which \
the primitive woman drew to
gether the skins of the animals 1
captured by her lord and mas
ter, fastening them with sinews
in lieu of thread. And be
cause needles were difficult to
obtain and sinew even more so, ,
and also because different oc
cupations required a change in ,
the manner of draping the pre
historic robe, a temporary fast-1
ening had to be evolved. This
was pinning and nature pro- ■
vided strong, smooth thorns
which required little or no preparation to make them i
serve their purpose. Thus the primitive family was
quite as dependent upon the needle and pin for their
bodily comfort as is the family of the present.
The Kaffirs in Africa ar© today using a curious
combination of the needle and pin. They have an iron
pin with a round head. They tie a fiber or thread,
around the needle next the head and, by puncturing
holes in the fabric they desire to sew, are able to put ,
in stitches effectively and smoothly, though their
method seems laborious compared with the use of the
modern needle whicji they are now learning to use.
Soon the Kaffir needle will be found only^ in muse
ums, although it is still being used by the older wom
en of the tribes.
• •» •
There is an almost endless variety of needles and 1
the different uses of them are increasing. The use of
machinery for knitting, shoe-making and garment-
making calls for special needles which must be
changed frequently to keep up with the improvements
developed in the machines. There are a number of t
kinds of cooking needles which were well known in 1
Europe, but it took an American to invent the ham j
needle which is used in all of the great meat packing
establishments of this country. It is really a thini
knife blade tapered to a point, but it has a long ovai
eye to carry the stout twine drawn through the end of |
ham and other pieces of meat which have to be hung
in the smok e house.
• * •
The improvements upon the various kinds of ma- ]
chine needles are largely made by Americans, although j
the best hand sewing needles are still suppposed to be |
imported from England. The development of the shoe-,
making trade called for many special kinds of needles, j
one of the most unique being grooved and curved into j
a fraction of a circle. It is used for putting the welts!
upon shoes. Many of the needles used in sewing j
leather ar© triangular in shape Instead of round. The'
fine glove needles are triangular down to the extreme j
point. The knitting machine could not be made prac
tical until the idea of having the needles hooked at the j
end occurred to the inventor. After that principle be
came recognized the evolution of the knitting machine',
was assured. No less than 1,397,533 gress of machine j
needles of various kinds were manufactured in this \
country last year and about one-sixth of these were
designed for some part of shoe manufacture.
• • •
The development of surgery calls for an almost
endless variety of rcedles for their somewhat grue-1
some uses. It is the development of the surgeon’s
needle which is largely Responsible for the success o£ |
many operations and for the comparatively unnotice-
able scars resulting from the use of the surgeon’s |
knife upon the face or hands. Expert dermatologists,
who devote their skill to the improvement of facial |
defects, have originated several new forms of surgeons’
needles, one of the most remarkable of which is thei
nose needle, which can sew clean through the cartilage
of the nasal organ when a change in its outline has *
been desirable.
• • •
According to a recent estimate the daily consump-,
tion of needles throughout the entire world amounts to
over 3,000,090. The women of the United States use |
about 300,000,000 ^needles each year. In addition to the
machine needles, about a half million gross of o#di-
nary sewing needles are manufactured in this country
each year, and a little more than that number are im
ported from England. The manufacture of needles
takes an intricate routine requiring at least twenty-two
distinct processes from the time the wire is cut into
proper length until the finished needles are finally ,
stuck into the purple paper used to prevent their
rusting.
• • •
To many people the placing of the eye in the needle
is the most interesting process, because of the minute
exactitude required. It is related of a Russian prince
who went through an English needle factory that he
expressed his surprise that a hole could be put in so
fine an object as the sliver of steel designed for a fine
cambric needle. “Will your highness give me a hair
from your head?” asked the manager who was showing
the distinguished visitor through the factory. The
hair was given and the manager passed it to th e work
man at the drilling machine who put a hole through it
and presented it to the prince threaded with a bit of
silk of microscopic fineness.
- « .
The manufacture of needles and pins Is usually
conducted In the same factory and the output is
usually reckoned together In the making up of govern
ment reports. There are now forty-six of these es
tablishments, fewer than were reported several years
ago, although their aggregate production Is much
larger. They employ about 5,000 wage earners, a large
percentage of whom are women and children, beeause,
with the improved machinery, there Is less need for
highly skilled laborers. The total products of these
factories amount to over 55,000,000 In annual value. )
The larger part of this Is in pins, for the United
States does a large part of supplying the world with 1
pins for which there is an ever-increasing demand.
... •
The common pins were first made in Europe about
the middle of the fourteenth century, and they became 1
general In England some time later. In 1483 the im- |
portatlon of pins from France was forbidden by an
English statute, although in 1540 Queen Catherine had
them imported for her own use. About this time they
began to be manufactured In England and there was a
special legislative act passed providing "No person
shall put to sale any plnnes only such as shall have a
double head and have the eye soldered fast to the
shank of the plnne, the shank well shapen, the points
well rounded, filed, canted and shaped." At that time,
as now, the be"3t pins were made of brass, but this law
was especially directed against iron pins whitened to
resemble brass.
Charles Lamb and His Snuff
One summer’s evening- I was walking with Charles
Lamb, and we had talked ourselves into a philosophic
contempt of our slavery to the habit of snuff taking,
with the firm resolution of never again taking a single
pinch. We threw our snuff boxes away from th# hill
on which we stood at Hampstead, far among the furze
and brambles below, and went home in triumph.
I began to be very miserable, was wretched all
night. In the morning I was walking on the same hill.
I saw Charles Lamb below, searching among the
bushes. He looked up laughing, and saying:
“What! You are come to look for your snuff box,
too?”
“Oh, no,” said I, taking a pinch out of a papoc in
my waistcoat pocket, “I went for a halfpenny worth
to the first shop that was open.”—From ‘William
Hone, His Life and Times/*