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About Weekly constitutionalist. (Augusta, Ga.) 185?-1877 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 15, 1868)
- 0< BY STOCKTON & CO, OUR TERMS. The following are the rates of Subscription: Daily, one year flO 00 Weekly, one year $3 00 [For the Constitutionalist, To i. Far away from the hiunts of men, Where human footsb ps ne’er have been ; Where the soil is never trod, Save by deer in wildest m >od, J sit me down amid-t the scene, Bathed in richest summer eheen, And mark the rich profusion there, Os beauties which are sweet and rare. 11. Before me rises the mountain wild, With its steep and rocky sides ; Amid those rocks where sun ne’er smiled The rattlesnake abides. And trees there are of hardy growth, Which, rising from the sod, Seem all companionship to loathe, As they lift their heads to God. nr. And at my feet a babbling brook Goes flowing to the sea, Singing through many a winding nook Its sweetest minstrelsy. And it speaks to «ny heart as it flowelh on In its rippling, dancing glee, Through summer sun and winter storm, And its story I’ll tell to thee: IV. I know not how the story it knew, Which it tells in its sparkling joy, Os one who, when lie to manhood grew, Became once more a hoy. V. But every ripple’s a gem of truth, And every shadow’s a thro a of pain ; Every sparkle’s the glow of youth, And every bubble’s Hope’s broken chain. With ripple an 1 shadow, sparkle and bubble, The story it sings to me— Os brightness and darkness, pleasure and trouble, All of Fate’s decree. SO N G: Bright as the sun at mid-day, Smiling as roseate morn, Filling all hearts with gladness, Sweet as first love’s dawn. Never oppressed by sorrow, But living in to-day ; Trusting to God the morrow, Willing Him to obey. With eyes like azure heaven, And lips that shame the rose— Lips whose smile is given To banish human woes; With footstep light and springing, The embodiment of joy, Is the maid, whose laughter ringing, Made this man once more a boy. VI. Dark and sombre was his spirit, Sunshine never cheered his heart; Feeling life was void of merit, Stung by disappointment’s dart; Shunning oft the happy circle, Since ho found no fellow there ; Thinking only how to shackle Every rising joy with care; VII. Wishing that the bonds which bound him Might he made of triple steel, So that when the morrow found him, He would more their cutting feel; Clinging to the midnight darkness, That his lite might, sterner be Full of fact and rigid harshness, Which no change should ever see; VIII. Clinging as the drunkard clingeth To the poison in the bowl: To the very life which bringeth Desolation to the soul; Doubting all, and trusting never, And, like Tantalus of old, Buffering pain which coineth ever When the prize slips from the hold. IX Now ns fowler o’er “ the cliff,” A frail rope his only stay ; Or as one in a fragile skiff, Embarks upon the treacherous sea ; X. His heart is caught and the prayer ia given, That his sonl may now be saved to heaven ; But the rope was snapped and the skiff wag lost, And the smil was back to its darkness tost. ’Twas the lightning’s flash that too plainly shows How desolate is the storm that blows. So, cursing fate and fellow men, He turns life’s darkest page again. XI. But at last, for God is kind, Light upon bis soul is cast — Light that’s pure and thrice refined, And which e’en to death will last. Happy soul, from bondage freed, Joyful heart to sunlight given; Restored at once to all thy need, To make this earth a heaven. XII. Restored at once by singing laugh, By happy smile and spirits gay— To joys which como whene’er we quaff To loved ones who’ve been far away. XIII. Pun and frolic, mirth and glee, t In the woods re-echoing ring ; And in his happy heart we see Return of brightest spring. With hands that tremble, holding joy, And lips that laugh while tasting mirth, W e miss the man, but find the boy, Rejoicing in his birth. This is the story told to me By that babbling, singing brook, A* it flowed in revelry, Through many a quiet nook. 8. A Seasonabi.e Lyric.—The following is a verse of a popular ditty at this season ot the year : Oh. the hills, those New Year bills I What a world of misery Their coming inst ils! As the merchants with their quills, Stuck behind their “ ears polite,” So carelessly invite Your kind and “ prompt attention ” To their bills I How they dun, dun, dun, As they kindly urge upon Your earliest attention, their blessed little bills. [From the London Spectator, December 14. A Formidable Indictment. ENGLAND A NATION OF THIEVES. One of the ablest moralists we ever knew, a man much sterner to himself than to the world around him, used to say that of all crimes theft was the one which showed the basest heart. It was absolutely selfish, it never excused itself by momentary passion, and it required, nine times out of ten, the coolest calculation and foresight. There is no provocation to forgery, as there may be to murder; no sudden, overmastering tempt ation to swindle, as there may be to many other equally evil acts. If that is true, and it is at all events only an exaggerated truth, the state of England is a bad one; for there cannot be a doubt that the master vice of the middle class, we had almost written their master passion, is thieving. We doubt if a race ever existed among whom pecuniary dishonesty teas so general or ho deeply affected the structure of society. We consider our selves a virtuous people, the salt of the earth, and it is not too much to sav that at this moment the basis ot half our laws, the cause of half or more than half our admin istrative weakness, the root of three-fourths of our commercial difficulties, is the well founded belief that a middle class Englishman, if h ( ‘ Qtte anything like a chance, will thieve, will expend his brain, his time, and his en ergies in able efforts to steal money which is not his. What is the dry rot which is destroying English administration, its di rectness, its simplicity, and its force, but the certainty of the nation that every offi cial, if left to himself and umvatched, will steal ? Our departments are hampered and shackled with checks till they can hardly work, till individual nower, and, therefore, individual genius, are suppressed ; and the object of all the checks is not to prevent in efficiency—that in England is not a crime, t hough elsewhere it is among the greatest— or to obviate the chance of oppression, but to prevent direct fraud, assaults of the vul garest kind on the national till. We cannot get a navy, because it is understood that in great establishments like dockyards every body not specially selected for honesty will thieve. Our army arrangements break down incessantly, because contractors, sub contractors, and purveyors generally, are supposed to be steeped to the lips in fraud. There is not a contract given in a govern ment oilice in which someone has not secured a “ perquisite,” or an “ advantage,” or a “ profit,” of which he would not, for the world, have his employers formally con scious ; which has not, in fact given some one usually a gentleman, the opportunity of thieving. Our whole system of provid ing for State needs by “open tender,” the stupidest ot all conceivable systems—for its theory is that Jones is Robinson’s equal as a manufacturer, which Jones is not —is openly based on the assumption,an assump tion perfectly true that without open tender the department will sell the contract, will, in fact, steal a large sum out of the Na tional Treasury. Our municipal difficulty is jobbery, that is, theft, —the practice every municipality is certain unless watched to indulge in, of robbing, the citizens to en rich its own members or other favored in dividuals. Even Parliament, even the Cabinet, the flower, or supposed flower, of Parliamentary life, is not beyond the same suspicion. We dare not let the Chiefs of Departments act tor themselves in a most important function, that of making the great contracts, choosing, in fact, the agents they think ablest, because we are certain that they will thieve, not indeed for themselves, but for their party. They will give Jones £1,000,000 to do what Robinson would do for £750,000, because Jones votes for them—that is, they will misappropriate | £250,000 of the money for which they are trustees. Look at our railway system. It is j the greatest and most important business or- j ganlzations ever devised by a nation, and it is j breaking down under habitual theft. Direc tors, animated by the hope of “ high quota tions for shares”—that is, of robbing buyers, by selling plated goods for silver—are de- ; daring in all directions fictitious dividends; j shareholders, animated by the same thirst for plunder, are winking at directors’ acts ; contractors arc sending in fictitious tenders at absurd prices; lawyers selling the companies, their own clients, to the vermin who eat their capital up; traffic managers making preferential, that is, fraudulent, bargains for carriage; every petty official taking bribes to grant privi leges his employers have not sold. Look at our commerce, shattered at this moment by every variety of elaborate and carefully devised plunder; by companies whose pros pectuses are drawn up with the intention of robbing the ignorant; by banks which make over shareholders’ money to directors; by manufacturers who will sell shoddy for cloth ; by tradesmen who cannot be trusted to avoid actual stealing of pennies from | women and children, actual theft of cop- j pers out of a blind mail’s tray; by false j weights and measures. Is there a trade | left in which half the tradesmen do not live j by petty imposition, that is, theft, by sell- j ing goods as bargains which are really dear, by enormous adulterations —by. in, fact, direct robberies of one kind or another? ! Agriculture is the most honest; and ask a | really God-fearing dealer of Mark lane what I he thinks of the morals of his trade, j whether he could remit his watchfulness j for an instant, a watchfulness directed ! wholly against theft, without being ruined. I What is a Bear’s combination t<T unduly , depress the price of goods but an elaborate theft? lie cannot, in London, send goods to j auction without a certainty of robbery, and j we are bitter, all of us, against “ knock- j outs ;” who whips the worst form of knock-; outs, the circulation of rumors intended to make worthless shares seem valuable, so that their holders may plunder the unwary? When Bears run down shares there is in deed an outcry, but when they run them up, who cares for the plundered public? The very dislike of theft, unless commit ted by violence, seems to have died out of j the national mind. City editors denounce j search into robberies as a “ vindictive pro- j eeediug,” and advise compromise as the only mode by which anything can be saved. Transactions which are thefts of the most unblushing kind bring to their perpetrators no rebuke, to the sufferers no sympathy.— If a man stands on London Bridge selling brass rings for gold, the police ultimately, and as an extreme measure, make him walk on ; but if he robs a thousand tcidoics success fully, by a prospectus deliberately framed to de ceive. he goes at once into Parliament. That, we shall be told, has always been so ; but the new evil is, that we are becoming con scious of such things, and still permit them and waste half our national energy in eu AUGU- PA, GA., WEDNESDAY MORNING, JANUARY 15, 1863, | deavors not to put them down, but to pre vent their occurring on too broad a scale. | Every organization we contrive is cum | bruous to decrepitude, and the reason is that we dare trust no one ; that we know j if the workhouse master is left absolute he will thieve ; if he is only inspected, the in spector will be “made pleasant;" if the Department is left to look after the inspect or, it will sell him immunity, not, indeed, I for cash, but for political support. There : is not a department in England in which one third of the expense might not be saved if men could be assumed to be barely “ law-honest ,” or in which, if we did assume it, the nation would not lose twice as much as it does.— There is not a great shop in London whose proprietor ■ is not paying a third of his gross ag gregate of salaries to persons whose real work is to prerent plunder —a plunder now so dreaded from its universality, that immense brain has been exerted, and is being exert ! el. to prevent salesmen ever touching cash j at all—to enable children to do that part of ; the work, as they do in managing lot teries. Every public amusement is becoming an organized arrangement for plunder every invention of science, from the telegraph to the patent office, is a j ‘twice to aid the quiet garroter, every need of | humanity is anew help to the dishonest to grow rich. Apart altogether from the injury to tiie national morals, the waste of all this is becoming prodigious, and will ultimately become unbearable; will either produce a cure, or, by engaging half society to watch the other half, will paralyze it for progress, and even lor exertion. At this moment, the country, as a whole,is paying, or rather beginning to pay, a sum in one department ol work alone which would ruin any other land. We do not hesitate to say that the t habitual dishonesty of the English middle class, their habit of thieving whenever they get the I chance without actually taking silver spoons , I will cost England one-half of the four or : five hundred millions it lias expended on the railway system ; that the country is now paying millions a year in the mere ef fort—a resultless effort—to check official corruption; that it is losing stuns to which even these are trifles, because great im provements cannot be made for tear of uni versal plunder. If Parliament but knew where to find decently honest agents it could rebuild our cities, rearrange our ten ures, suppress pauperism by insurances, pay half the national debt by absorbing the nearly ruined railway system. What stops, to take a single example, a State manage ment ot the railways, which, by halving the gross cost of communication, might double the national power ? Simply the openly expressed conviction of men’s minds that if the State ftiacl the railways, Mr. Gladstone is the only man who could be trusted not to “job” them, that is, to thieve; and the still frightfuller latent thought that Mr. Gladstone shows weak ness, “ puerism ” in being so absolutely be yond suspicion. The worst of all this is, that ice see no cure for it. Every nations suffers from periods ot violence, or of licentiousness, or of bigotry, or of apparent weakness, and after a time they pass away, to reaopear at more and more distant intervals; but the habit of theft is in its nature chronic. The de sire for “comfort” without work, which is its root, is one which civilization every year intensifies, and there are no barbarians left to bid civilization halt for centuries, that its poisonous vapors may have time to blow off from the face of the world. Pun ishment docs little, as we see, for we al ready punish offenses against property more than offenses against life, and the only effect is to change burglarly for swin dling, robbery for forgery, “dacoity” by professional ruffians for “ dacoity ” by smooth respectables banded together to rob the ignorant by plausible prospectuses. If Claude Duval were alive now he would not be fool enough to rob coaches. De would get up a tea company. The single remedy, wfe fear, is national poverty, which, by making all men watchmen, prevents the very inception of crime; and, as retribution comes for all things evil, we may rely on it that sooner or later, if this utter demoralization lasts, poverty will be the national portion. One grand evil of our villages is larceny—an evil so widespread that it seems beyond the correction of those who suffer; but let a thief go into a poor country—Bengal or Berne—and try to steal the husk of the rice or the fallen grapes, and he will learn once for all that there is one and a bitter preven tive for habitual theft, the conversion of every man with a shilling into a savage watchdog over his pennies. It is poverty through loss of trade and over taxation, which, if this contemptible crime spreads further, will be upon us; and when it comes we warn officials, contractors, directors, and the like, they will have a bad quarter of an hour. When the con vention sent away contractors by the dozen to the guillotine, sol diers' shoes ceased to be made of brown paper, The Bankrupt Law—A Mooted Qustion. There is said to be diversity of opinion among lawyers and commissioners in bank ruptcy as to when the fifty per cent, clause of the bankrupt law went or will go into effect, and adds that the question will probably be submitted to Chief Justice Chase for decision. A glance at the law itself will show that there is no ground upon which to base such a doubt. In section 33 it is provided : “And in all proceedings in bankruptcy com menced one year from the time this a *t shall go into operation, no discharge shall be grant ed to a debtor whose assets do not pay fifty per centnm of the claims against his estate, unless the assent, in writing, of a majority in number and value of his creditors who have proved their claims is filed in the case at or be fore the time of application for discharge.” The act went into operation June 1, 1867. Gen. George G. Meade and Staff. —Major General George G. Meade arrived in Atlanta on Sunday morning, about 2 o’clock, accompanied by Brevet Brio:. Gen. R. J. Drum, Cols. Meade aud Emory, who compose the General’s per sonal staff General Drum, we are informed, is the Adju tant General of this Department. The distinguished party have taken rooms at the National Hotel. On yesterday Gen. Meade held a reception at the headquarters on Marietta street, at which all the officers of the post attended in full uni form. Last night the General was serenaded at his hotel. Quite a crowd collected on the occa sion, and as we strolled through it— in cog— we were pleased to perceive that bnt one sentiment prevailed—a feeling of gratification that the Government authorities had removed the old and substituted the new commander for the people of Georgia. We sincerely trust that the present hopeful ness of th£ people ot Atlanta may he more than realized.— Atlanta Opinion, Monday. [Naples Correspondence London Times. Vesuvius. THE ERUPTIONS “ A SPECTACLE GRAND BEYOND ALL POWER OF DESCRIPTION.” Vesuvius, the eruptions of which have been hitherto a source of amusement, has fhis week awakened considerable appre hension. Every Gay almost it has present ed a different appearance. On Monday it was covered with a mantle of snow, which was striped at intervals with broad stripes of lava, and the explosive force of the moun tain began again to increase, throwing out smoke and dark colored sand, with slight detonations. “ The smoke holes,” said Pro fessor Palmieri, “werecovered with subli mates of sa [marine and metallic chlorures ; the smoke issued, too, not only from the cone on the summit, but from another la teral hole which, from the great deposit of material around it, lias grown into the dignity ot a cone. On Tuesday night the spectacle was grand beyond all power of description. Large masses of lava were shot unto a great height, one of which, even from the city, was seen to fall like a mighty rock, and roll down the sides of the great cone. Streams of red hot lava were flowing over, the crater, and bathing the whole of the upper part of the mountain while flery lava, ashes and sand were sent up with an immense impetus, irradiating the sky far and near. At intervals during the whole of the night there was a loud and continued cannonade as of artillery which was heard in the most distant parts of Naples. Clouds and darkness hid the mountain from us for two days, and what was going on under their mysterious veil it was impossible to say ; but a north wind swept them all away, and then Vesuvius was again revealed in all its magnificence, and one may almQst add in all its terrors. “ The eruption of Thursday,” to quote Palmieri: “Was at its greatest intensity. Enor mous, masses of solid lava were launched to a fear!ul height, falling and rolling down in every direction, thus rendering the as cent of the mountain j T et more dangerous. 1 he detonations were very frequent and so violent as to cause the walls of the Obser vatory to rock backwards ami forwards.” It was necessary to detach the scientific instruments from the walls and place them on the ground in order to preserve them from the strong unduiatory shocks. Per sons who were present at the time compare their sensations with those which they have felt on board a vessel when rocked by the waves. On the same day the inhabitants of Torre del Greco were again in so much ap prehension of another disaster that Palmi eri went over to examine the extinct holes which in 1861 spread devastation over the city. He so far satisfied them by reporting that “there was no imminent danger,” and thus tranqullizing the population, a great proportion of whom were making arrange ments to leave. As I write, the eruption continues with equal violence, and dense masses oi dark smoke beaten down bv a bitter northeaster are 'sweeping over the sea. Crowds of visitors have come in to see this wondrous spectacle, and among others, some of the members of the Turin Alpine Club. Crimes Committed on New Year’s Day. drunken policeman, let loose in the Seventeenth Precinct, ran up and down the street like a wild man, clubbing every citi zen he met, and shooting an inoffensive German, who is likely to die from his wound. This Metropolitan maniac was finally caught and caged. A man was stabbed by a highway robber in Rivingtou street. There was another stabbing affray in the Eighteenth Ward. A woman, aban doned by her husband who is in New Orleans, committed suicide by taking opium, in the Wetrnore House; and on New Years night, two brothers residing in Fourth street, returning home at a late hour, were assaulted by ruffians with brass knuckles and slung shots, their skulls frac tured, and last night both of the men were dying. In this case there were no arrests, though the day before it was publicly an nounced that the entire police force would be on duty, with the reserves in readiness for any sudden call. It is a shocking show ing of crime for a single day, and that day a general, genial holiday, when even crime might be expected to slink away out of sight in the slums of the Five Point’s neigh borhood. Instead of this, ruffianism ran riot, and the record presents a striking con trast with the comparative absence of crime in the city on Christmas Day. \_Xeic York World. Old Man Grant Sounds llis Boy "Llyss.” —The General’s father came to town the other day, and stopped with " Llyss,” as he calls his boy, whom he found seated at his fireside, smoking, of course, and surrounded by members of his private and military family. About the first thing the old gentleman did after shed ding his over coat, was to eorne at his un pumpable offspring with “ Ulyss, are you in favor of nigger suffrage ?” [No response, only vigorous puffs.J “I say, Ulyss, are you iii favor of nigger suffrage?” “What clo you think of it ?” inquired the General, with Yankee shrewdness. The old one states his position—he's for an intelligence qualification, and so on. “ Well, now, Llyss, Ive answered your question, I want you to answer mine: Are you in favor of nigger suffrage ? If you are, you’ll get beat all hollow, with all your popularity, lor Ohio went fifty thousand against it, and if she was to vote again on it to-morrow, she and go a hundred thousand the same way.” " havn’t talked politics much for the last five or six years,” was the reply of Ulysses, *• the Silent.” At last accounts the old gentleman was in doubt as to the position ot “ L lyss ” on negro suffrage. The Mum Ultsses.— Nashville, Dec. 31, IS67.—A war-worn veteran of the Union army gets off the following on Gen. U. S. Grant: Grant is in the condition of a boy who was about to start out in the world, and as he was a great favorite with his mother, though a com plete simpleton, she gave him this piece of ad vice : “ Now, Tom, just keep your mouth shut and people will not know you are a fool.'' — Tom, a dutiful boy, remembered the maternal advice. He had been from home, however, only a little while when an inquisitive old Yan kee commenced asking some questions, and, upon his obstinate silence, turned away in dis gust, exclaiming, “ Bah ! he’s a fool.” Tom went back to his mother, and his first word was, “mother, I kept my mouth shut, but they found me out." Anti-Reticence. Are the National Banks a Benefit to the Country- To the Editor of the X. Y. Herald : In looking over the working of our na tional banking system I am led to believe tii it the contract is one-sided and, as a gen eral rule, those that should be aided are left out in the cold. The great objection, to my mind, is its perfect independence of all commerce and trade. If we had only $400,- 000,000 of Government loans the custom might do. with some alteration ; but now they can buy and loan on those securities to an amount without limit, and 1 am told a large number of the banks do so to the exclusion of all other business. Many ask why it is that Government securities are so well sustained, while all others are receding to a point that does not in any case justify the fall, and make bankrupts of many ; for they cannot understand, with the large in crease in bank, that it should be so." Per haps a reply may be given that will answer for the present. For instance, a man with $500,000 in securities, as follows : SIOO,- 000 in Government and $400,000 in promis cuous securities—if he wished to borrow $300,000, he would have no difficulty in borrowing SIOO,OOO on his Governments ; but in nine cases out often it would puzzle him to obtain the $200,000 on his other se curities ; not that the securities would not be ample, but he w T ould have to come into competition with those who borrowed on Government bonds or were so rich in bank facilities they would have a preference. Now, this state of things cannot con tinue without bringing distress upon all; for even those who have largely invested in governments must feel the decliue in other securities. It would be useless to enter into a discussion about the soundness of the banks and t.ieir usefulness ; a few of the banks do all their power to carry out the true principle of banking; but 1 think it will be found that the greater number arc not doing so, and that their enormous gains are eating up the commercial community. If I am satisfied to invest in Government bonds, which cost from five to ten percent, premium, the banks should be good, with a bonus of ninety per cent, allowed them in currency. In fact, they have for an invest ment of SIOO,OOO interest on $190,000, while others have to be satisfied with interest on SIOO,OOO, and out of that amount to be tax ed to support the banks, though we may not have one share of stock in them. As constituted the system is an evil, with so much power that it will control all our political and financial future; for no one believes that it will yield a point so long so long as the present profits are realized, and that without risk, for it is independent of all commerce, by investing in governments. Another Ocean Cable.— A company is being organized in England to submerge a fourth cable across the Atlantic, of which Brest, France and New York will be the termini. This company is called the “ Franco-American Submarine Cable Com pany,” and will organize with a capital stock of £900,000 sterli.jg. One-third of the stock and directors will be given to England, one-third to France, and one third to the United States. The books have been opened in England, and its share of the stock subscribed. The French bank ers, it is said, have guaranteed the sub scription of another third. A contract has already been made with the India Rub ber and Gutta Percha Telegraph Company of Silvertown, London, for the manufacture of 3,700 miles’ of cable, which will support itself in water a distance of thirty miles.— The contractors have taken the English subscription as an advanced payment, and will at once proceed with the manufacture of the cable, which will probably be laid next summer. This new company have received valua ble concessions already, including one from the French Government, giving them, for five years, all trans-Atlantic business corn ing this way that touches French wires, and one from the Submarine Telegraph Company across the English Channel, who agree to give them all the messages that touch their wires en route to Brest. But the great advantage claimed by this company for the public is expedition and cheapness in the transmission of dispatches. Having a direct line of submarine cable, the time consumed in repeating messages between New Y'ork aud* Heart’s Content will be saved, and it is understood that the tariff will be but one shilling sterling per word. It is expected that at this rate the company will secure sufficient business to occupy the cable twelve hours of the twen ty-four. A good operator will send or re ceive fifteen hundred words per hour, yield ing a revenue of nine hundred pounds per day, or two hundred and seventy thousand pounds per year. It is estimated that the expenses of running the line will be about seventy thousand pounds per year, leaving net profits two hundred thousand pounds, or twenty-two percent, of the capital stock. [7Y. Y. Herald. An Angola Prophet. —The death of Mr. Van Bureu, President of the Albany Young Men’s Christian Association, by the accident on the Lake Shore Railroad last Wednesday is confirmed. His trunk has been found at Buffalo, and the corresponding check among the charred remains gathered up from the debris of the burned car. The remains were so fearfully burned as to be unrecognizable. Last Sabbath week he spoke, as usual, at one of the mission stations of the Association. In the course of his remarks he expressed the fear that he would not be again permitted to address those who heard him, as he had a premonition that his contemplated journey would be his last. How truthfully was bis end foreshad owed to him. Although in very moderate cir cumstances, he had a life policy of $5,000, and, we are told, an accident policy of the same amount—the latter renewed at Cleveland on the day of his death. Killed by a Train.— While the down West Point freight train was at LaGrange, on Thurs day, a lad about sixteen years of age, named Harrison Sloper, Stepped upon the engine to sell apples; as the train started he endeavored to step off, but fell between the engine and tender, the wheels of the latter passing over and dreadfully mangling his bodv. He lived in great agony until about five o’clock the next morning, when he expired. We under stand his family was on the eve of moving to Atlanta.— Atlanta Era. Where one person possessing genius is nipped in the bad by lack of appreciation, two are slaughtered by too sudden recognition and over-appreciation. As an English magazine writer 6aid of Professor Aytoun, “The laurel he got was too big for him ; he 6taggered un der it.” VOL. 27. NO. 3 It is no longer a secret of the chemist’s labor atory that clear, golden syrups can be made from stiichand sulphuric acid; that delicious w ines and brandies can be made from beet root with ethers (or flavor; that a barrel of peanuts ( in be transformed into excellent coflee; that lard can absorb an enormous quantity of water in cert..in conditions ; that in tact there seetnS no limit to the adulterations that an intelligent and dishonest chemist cannot practice upon his fellow-men. All these marvels of chemical science have in these latter days become de graded into mere tricks ol trade, and their chief beauty is in their capacity to enable unscrupu lous dealers to lighten the pockets and destroy the stomachs of the confiding and consuming public. Concerning the article of champagne, a writer in the Portland Star tells us that it is now made from a thousand different substances, even refined petroleum. Yes; from the fiery benzoles a sparkling, bubbling, foaming cham pagne can be produced which will delight the eye, tickle the palate, gladden the heart mo mentarily—but quicken our paces toward the graveyard. This is anew use for petroleum, which those who have been experimenting with it as an agency for generating steam have little dreamed of. Who can say that our Pennsylva nia oil territory, now considered mostly worth less, may not some day be regenerated into the great champagne-producing country of the world ?—Philadelphia Star. The Adulteration of Women.—A spicy correspondent of the Louisville Courier relates the matrimonial experience of one Verdant Green, a friend of his : “Verdant had lived an unsophisticated life until he had reached the ripe nge of twenty one. About that time a neighbor of V.’s father employed a governess from New York. V. met her at a pic-nic, and as she was (he first lady he bad over met that could make him feci at case in her society, he fell violently in love with her. His bashfulness, under the skilful tutelage of the governess, wore rapidly away, and ere long he had consented to become her bridegroom.— The bridal party stopped at a Cincinnati hotel, and, after many a weary hour, the most mo mentous moment in a man’s whole life, arrived for Verdant. On two chairs ware piled a pyra mid of skirts, &c., and on a table near the bead of the bed the astonished eye of Verdant beheld a sight which froze him with horror.— fhere were false calves, false hips, false palpi tations, false hair. In one tumbler of water was a full set of false teeth, from another a glass eye stared at the bewildered bridegroom. How long he stood, Verdant knoweth not, but after a while a hollow and strange voice from under the bedclothes addressed him thus : “ ‘Why don’t you come to bed, dear ?’ “‘So I would, but by , I don’t know whether to get into bed or on the table.’” How to Prevent Wet Feet.—A lady sends us the following, copied from an old receipt book. We shall give it a trial, and hope any of readers will report their experience alter giving it a fair trial: “I have had three pair of boots for the last six years, (no shoes,) and 1 thick I shall not require any more for the next six years to come. The reason is that I treat them in the following manner: I put a pound of tallow and a half pound ol rosin in a pot on the fire ; when melt ed and mixed, I warm the hoots and apply the hot stud with a painter’s brush until neither the sole nor upper leather will suck any more. If it is desired that the boots should imme diately take a polish, dissolve an ounce of wax in a teaspconlul of lamp black, a day after the boots have been treated with the tallow and rosin, rub over them this wax in turpentine, but not before the tire. Thus the exterior will have a coat of wax alone, and shine like a mir ror. Tallow or other grease, becomes rancid, and rots the stitching as well as leather; but the rosin gives it an antiseptic quality which preserves the whole. Boots and shoes should be so large as to admit of wearing cork soles. Cork is so bad a conductor ot heat that with it in boots the feet are always warm on the cold est stone floor.” —American Farmer. — Love’s Labor Lost.— We should think that Ur. Homer Virgil Milton Miller would feel rather flat, after expending so much gas on Cem Pope, to find that his hero was not ap preciated at headquarters. All of his boot licking has been lost; all of his flattery has been wasted. The image which he set up for men to worship Ims been hurled from its pedes tul, and Miller is lett alone to mourn over its fall. The people of Georgia have learned to place a proper estimate on Dr. Miller. He has been called an orator, but he is found to be only a bag of wind —Federal Union. Deaths--Information has come to us through private letters, of the death of Mrs. F. G. Wingfield. This sad event, which will be deplored by many, took place early in Decem ber, at her home in Mississippi. Also, died on the 23d lilt., in Liberty county, Georgia, Ida C., wile of Charles A. Alexander, formerly of this place. Also, died in this place, on Wednesday, the Ist inst., Mrs. James Cull, after many years of illness and suffering, and at a very advanced a gG- Washington (Ga ) Gazette. The African Convulsionaries, of the tribe of Aissa Houha, must be very extraordinary peo ple. Their advertisement in a London paper tells us that before mixed audiences of ladies and gentlemen they charm serpents, eat fire, bear a red hot shovel on their tongue wiih de light, stamp out an intense fire with bare feet, eat prickly cactus, walk upon the keen edge of a sword, and perform other agreeable feats.— But they do more than all this. They have special extraordinary morning performances, to which gentlemen only are admitted ; and what they do on these occasions the Barnum who exhibits them leaves to the imagination of the curious. A Sudden Death.— Mrs. M. V. Hicks (widow of YV. B. Hicks, who was killed by YY m. D. Morris, several years ago,) died very suddenly Tuesday last, and under peculiar eir cumstances. Coroner Thomas P. Walker was notified of the matter, and after obtaining the particulars of the affair, summoned a jury of inquest. One of the witnesses testified that on Tuesday morning the deceased complained of severe pains in the back of the head, and about the heart and otomacb, and partook of some spirits, in order to relieve this excruciating pam. As she rapidly grew worse, a physician was called, who prescribed for her, but death eusued a 6hort time after. By direction of the jury of inquest, a post mortem examination of the body was made by Dr. YV. P. Geiger, as sisted by Dr. John Lynch, who reported that “her death was caused from an inordinate col lection of gall-stones in the gall-bladder, which produced congestion of the liver and adjacent parts.” * 1 wenty-(wo gall-stones, each about an inch in circumference, encased in a sort of bag, were taken from the pit of the stomach of the unfor tunate woman. —Columbia Phoenix. # ■ Patrick Kennedy has recovered $lB5 in an ac tion against seven citizens of Wrentbam, for riding him on a rail in the spring of 1565, for having expressed joy at the deatn of President Lincoln. The Savannah National Bank.— This hank has declared a dividend of thirty-seven and one half per cent., payable on demand. A satisfac tory showing for shareholders.
