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VOL 1 -NO 80. TIIOMASYILLE, GEORGIA, THURSDAY MORNING, AUGUST 15, '880 $5.00 PER-ANNUM err 2 ^ i—< CQ THE MELON SEASON CLOSING. The Shipments North Dwindling Very Rapidly Now. The Georgia melon crop 1ms about all gone north; that is, the bulk of it and as much as can be profitably ship ped, ns the Georgia melons arc now- brought into competition with fruit grown closer to the northern markets. The very choicest melons in the New York market now would not com mand to exceed §18 per hundred, and they ranged as low during the past week as $8. .Close observers of the local melon market could not have failed to no tice last week, as the northern market began to slack, a larger and finer variety of melons were put on the retail market and melons that would have cost from 40 to 75 cents apiece two weeks ago have been retailing here the last week at from 10 to 15 cents, in fact one could have a pick fronn the largest melons from some wagons and street corners for 10 cents, and 15 cents was about the highest figure asked. The market was glut ted Saturday, and toward the closing hours of the market 5 cents would buy a melon as large as a man could conveniently carry off. The Morning News lias published from day to day, for the past month, the movement of Georgia melons by rail, as approximately correct as the nature things would permit, but the railroad? from which the infor mation - had to be obtained were not as particular and prompt as they might have been to secure greater accuracy. The Savannah, Florida and Western railway was more prompt in its reports, but during the month ending Aug. 10 it missed some day*. ^Froni the published reporpof the'past month- it iir credited with moving 750 car loads of melons. The Central has reported the move ments of melons over its lines for but three days in August, although for the month ending last Saturday night, by a summary of its daily reports to the Morning News, it handled 1,888 carloads of the fruit. The receipts of the Georgia South ern and Florida, the Southwestern, the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia, and one or two shorter lines foot up 1,171 carloads, making a to tal of If,.'107 cars of Georgia melons handled during the month ending Aug. 10, which cannot bn set n ns the entire out put of the Gcortria crop, for the season stated. The heaviest shipments reported to the Morning News during the period under review, were jnadc on July 17, wh^i the receipts were .‘504 car loads, and on July 18 when 410 cars were shipped. There has been a heavy falling oil since Aug. 1, as the entire icceipts’rcported fbr August thus far amounts to but 271 ears, and while a few shipments may Ire made, the sea son is practically over, and Georgia planterswill now begin to look after their cotton harvest, which is rapidly approaching, and the railroads will begin to hustle to get the empty cars back, ready to hnndle the cotton crop, which promises to.be one of the best, and which, if it meets with no ex tremes of weather, will be of excel lent quality.—.Savannah News. llriT.u.o, N. Y., Aug. 12.—Mrs. Lavinia Atwell Fillmore, relict of the late Jlev. Clemen Fillmore, who ^as first cousin of the late ex-I’resi- dent Millard Fillmore, will celebrate her 102nd birthday to morrow at her home in Clarence, this county. Mrs. Fillmore is without doubt the oldest person in Western New York, and retains her faculties to a remarkable degree. She was born Aug. 15, 1787; aiid was married 1° the pioneer Meth odist preacher, Gler.cn Fillmore, Sept. 20, 1800; She has lived in Clareucc ever since her husband died, in 1875. Dr. Hammond says he has received numerous letters, relative to the Brown-,Scqunrd Elixir, which shows a remarkable state of popular idiocy. MRS. CANFIELD Proves to be Simply an Untraveled No body. TorEKA, Kan., August 8.-—Editor Constitution : Mrs. James H. Can- field’s criticism on the south, publish ed in the Topeka Capital, was too silly to meet but a passing notice, and rebuke, by the Kansas people and press. To tell the truth nine hundred and ninety-nine persons out of every thou sand, in Kansas, did not know the distinguished professor was married, till the publication of that ridiculous batch of nonsense, signed by Mrs. Canfield. The lady, in question, is not in so ciety, nor 1ms she figured prominently in any way in Kansas that any one can remember. She is simply the wife of a learned professor, inexper ienced and untraveled—naturally un able to reason from cause. to eflect— prouc to look upon mole bills as mountains, and thus incapable of ap preciating the genuine, noble liospi-. tality of true southern ladies. If Mr. or Mrs. Canfield received any reception upon their arrival home—or that they have yet arrived —local histoiv fails to state. They are, however, probably located, at this time, in the dull, quiet, little uni versity town of Lawrence, where Mrs. Canfield lias, doubtless, entered upon her domestic duties, which she never should have abandoned. She is not the sister ot John James Ingalls, the caustic senator of Kansas, the probability ol relationship only being conjectured by some on account of the numerous bad breaks of both with tlie“pcu.” The truth, and the whole truth, fljiout Mii.,C|UVfi§ld’s|amuus (?>- let ter is, that it fell very flat here in the west. It did not even create a ripple of excitement. Kansas and her people arc broad- gmigcd ; thousands of Kansans have traveled all over the south, and know the actual conditions of affairs iu that portion of the United States. The writer of this was in Nashville himself, the recipient of that un bounded, open-handed hospitality of which the south and only the soutli can boast. He as well as all Kansas can see the coming events that are already casting their shadows before—that the south, in nnotlier decade, will hnvc outstripped all sections of our common country Jn material pro gress ; that the south to-day has a larger per cent of actual Americans than in any other section ; that in educational and religious matters the south stands on a par with New Eng land. Kansas glories iu the progress of Jlic south, and wishes her untold prosperity, Sirs, Canfield's letter represented the opinions of nobody in the west, not even those of Mrs. Canfield her self, for, since that dear lady retracts everything she wrote, wo can charit ably suppose she never had any. Re- spectfully, C. K. Hoi.i.iday, Jit., Editor Kansas Democrat. That was a touching incident which took place in Fort Valley dur ing the reunion of. the Third Georgia Regiment. It seems that at Sharps- burg when the battle storm eleared, and the dead and the dying were re moved from the field, there were two brothers found among the Union army’s dead, who had been slain near the old brick wall by the Third Geor gia Regiment. They had both gone to the froqt side hy-side and died heart to heart. The mother of these two brave hearts sent to the Third Geoigia at Fort Valley the other day, a piece of the old stone wall ta ken from the spot where her boys, had fallen. — - — The legislature is still pegging away at the lease and betterment question. Georgia Mirrored. Col. A. K. McClure, of Philadelphia, in his article on “The South,Industrial and Political,” thus refers to Georgia: “With forty cotton factories and the ceaseless hum of nearly two (nearer four) hundred thousand spindles, and with nearly one hundred furnaces and iron mills to diversify industry and open up new markets for the farmers, there must be progress. The factory and the school are the great civilizers of the age in the south, and they are now doing a good work in Georgia. * * With the impulse given to the spindle and the loom it is not an ex travagant assumption to say that the growth of cotton will be doubled in Georgia in the next ten years, and Georgia spindles will double the value of the Georgia product. * # Now that peace has come with all its benefi cent fruits, the hum ot thousands of spindles and the clank of hundreds of loom; declare how Georgia is aiding in the creation of the new south.” In closing what is termed in the pamphlet an "Imperfect outline of Georgia’s great resources and advan tages” the compiler will say: “With a territory covering five de grees ol latitude, embracing a varied and extraordinary topography, ranging from ocean level to five thousand feet altitude’on the northern border, (and also eight of the nine temperatures science assigns to the vast and varied expanse) and a consequent diversity, salubrity and healthfulncss of climate unsurpassed on the globe; with a soil of exceeding general fertility adapted to all the grains and vegetable pro ductions and fruits not strictly tropical; with a variety and extent of mineral resources without a parallel on any other equally compact territorial area anywhere; with 58,000 square miles of territory traversed by numerous large, full and constant streams (which neither freeze over in winter or go dry m summer) besides hundreds ot small er water courses (lowing to all points of the compass, possessing in the aggregate illimitable water powers; with superior (and increasing) railway and other transportation facilities; and With a commanding (it might be said controlling) geographical position, (wedged in, as it were, between the Atlantic and the gulf, in the southeast ern part of the union) with an Atlantic coast line of nearly one hundred and filly miles, having on it one of the largest, best and safest harbors on the globe, and nearly touching the gulf on the west—continued and rapid growth are assured, and designate Georgia as a field of the richest promise to every department ol human endeavor. Ad apted to the production oi sea island and upland cotton, rice, corn, sugar, and si.mi-tropical fruits in the low lands: of corn, cotton and all fruits not scnu-tropical, and stupendous water power in the midlands; and all the grains, grasses, stock and all Hie hardy fruits, and iron, coal, copper, granite, slate, marble, gold, gems, and sublime scenery in the mountain highlands— no state in the union presents a more inviting field for enterprise with more promising prospects'—no matter what the enterprise or pursuit—to the north ern : cttler or foreign immigtant, for permanent settlement, or to the capital ist seeking to make safe and remuner ative investments.” Prophesying Calamity. In the Scientific American of July 0 appeared a paragraph in which J. E. Thick ton expresses similar apprehen sion in respect to drilling the earth and exhausting the natural gas as expressed by the following professors in a recent issue of the Popular Science Monthly. Prof. Joseph F. Jones assumes the earth to be a hollow sphere filled with a gaseous substance, called by us nat ural gas, and lie thinks it is that which is escaping, He compares the earth to a balloon lloated and kept distended by the gas in the interior, which, it exhausted, will cause the crust to col lapse, affect (he motion of the earth in its orbit, cause it to lose its place among the heavenly bodies, and fall in pieces. Another writer thinks drilling should be prohibited by stringent laws. lie, too, thinks there is a possibility of an explosion, though from another cause. Should such a disaster occur, "the country along the gas licit from Toledo through Qliio, Indiana and Kentucky will be ripped up to the depth ot 1,30a or 1,500 feet and flopped over like a pancake, leaving a chasm through w liich the waters of Lake Erie will come down, filling the Ohio and Mis- sippi valleys, and blotting them out forever.” Still another theorist has investigat ed the gas wells with telephones ami delicate thermometers, and he announc es startling, discoveries. He distin guished sounds like the boiling rocks, and estimated that a mile and one-half or so beneath the Ohio and Indiana gas field the temperature of the earth is 3,500 degrees. The scientists says an immense cav ity exists,, and that here the gas is stored; that a mile below the bottom of the cavity is a mass of roaring, seething flame, which is gradually eating into the rock floor of the cavern and thinning it. Eventually the flames will reach the gas, and a terrific ex plosion will ensue.—Scientific Ameri can. These fellows Will keep on monkey ing with gas, petroleum and other sub stances,which now, according to scien tists, support the crust ot the earth, until something will happen. We tell you, things are getting mighty shaky on this earth. The Last Duel at Sand Bar Ferry. From the Chronicle. The last duel at Sand Bar Ferry, the famous fighting ground on the Savannah river, just three miles from Augusta, was a fatal one. Though many meetings have been arranged since its time, that were to take place at the noted grounds, none have oc curred. Charles D. Tilley, a hand some, dashing looking Irishman of thirty, was lionized in Augusta. No less popular was George E. RatclifFc, though he was not of such prepossess ing appearance as Tilley. Tilley heard of rumors detrimental to his character repeated by Ratcliffe, and a retraction was demanded. The reply that the talk was current rumor was followed by the refusal to retract, and the duel was arranged. The report in the Augusta Chroni cle of the meeting was full as regards the shooting, meagre as to the cause. Fourteen years ago next December the men faced each other. The meet ing was strictly business like. Be sides the seconds, each principal had invited four friends to bo present. There were, however, twenty persons present. The trip to the ground was made in carriages. Ratclifie was the 'first to arrive. He sprang lightly from his vehicle, threw oil his over coat, lighted a cigar and remained quiet for a little while. Presently he remarked, “Those fellows are slow getting hero.” Just as the words were uttered the Tilley party drove up. Tilley, wearing a button-hole boquet, sprang lightly from his carriage and coolly rolled and lighted a cigarette. “I see Ratcliffe wears a Derby. Tilley will wear a silk cap. lie has brought two, aud invites your friend to wear this one,” said Tilley’s friend, addressing Ratcliffc’s second. “Tell him I will wear my own hat,” was Ratcliffc’s response. “Ready,” both announced. Tilley lifted his hat to his antagonist. Ratclifie smiled sar castically and bowed very low. Pis tols were handed them. They were to lie given the command, “Fire, one, two, throe, stop,” shots to be tired be tween “lire” and “stop.” Ratcliffe shot first. Tilley’s pistol was heard fully a second afterward. Both men stood motionless. Then Tilley reeled a little. “Demand another shot!” commanded the latter’s second. “I can’t; I am done for.” He was hit in the abdomen and died next day. Rat- clill’e was not hit. It was the saddest of duels. When seconds, principals and friends stood on tlie ground there were congregated a pirty of intimate friends—the prin cipals, for the time, excepted—men who in social aud business life met each other every day. Excepting the principals, all of the parties are alive to day and are well known business and professional men of Augusta. Ratcliffe met all charges against him in court, exhonerated himself aud went west. I-atcr lie went to Mexico. Returning to Sau Francisco a few years after ho died of consumption. Such was the last meeting under the code at Sand Bar Ferry. Smith—“Robinson told 1110 that his wife had been run over by a coach and seriously injured.” John—“You can’t believe what Robinson says, he is such a braggart. I’ll bet it was only a delivery wagon.” Knocked Dow PRICES! KNOCKED 10WH PRICES —AT—? LEVY’S Our Mr. Levy is now in New York'making Fall purchases, and lie lias sent' us word to KNOCK DOWN PRICES on all sum mer goods, and make rbom for our immense Fall and Winter stock that is coming. So, from; now.' on, all Spring aud Snmmer goods go at old “Knocked Down Prices.” Remnant table full of choice bargains every week. Levys Dry Soils fa Mitchell House Corner.