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W* F. SMITH, Publisher, VOLUME IX. TPOICS OF THE HAY. Cetewayo is to visit England in the spring. Who will mourn for the plumber— perhaps not one. Carl Schurz is lecturing on Civil Service Reform. — ! St. Gothard’s Tunnel was completed on the 23d of December. Better to predict and mis# than never to predict at all.— Vennor. “Gail Hamilton” will spend the winter with Mrs. Blaine in Washington. A newspaper published at Tin Cup, Kansas, is called the Qarfield Banner. It seems that the public generally in England are disgusted with the Guiteau trial. Hhuyler Colfax assorts there is noth ing that would indifHe him to return to public life. - Tl■ - - - - , Strange as it may seem, the country is full of people who are seeking for the autograph of Guite.au. — ? —^— Prices are keeping right up, and the farmer who*happens to have a full granery, should* be hKppy. Asa weather prophet, Vennor has lost his prestige, now and forover more. We swear by*him no longer. The Italian Senate has adopted a bill which confers the right of suffrage on all who can read 9nd.wri.tet Queen Victoria requests the London Standard, to deny the statement that she will open Parliament in person. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, like Mr. Whittier, pleads inability to write poems to order. Growing old, you know. The London Times says the Onitean trial is unprecedented. ,We are pretty sure it is, so* far as this country is con cerned. , . It is not known how near the North Pole the Jeannette reached. The de tails of the expedition are awaited with somo anxiety. Strangely Guiteau has not yet in sulted any of the jury on his case, but his whack at thqm will come when they bring in their verdict. United Ireland , a newspaper, is now printed in London, all the material of tlio concern having been shipped there from Ireland the past week. An eminent physician says high-heeled shoes cause the calf of the leg to dwin dle auay to the leanness of decrepit age and become a thin, shapeless shank. In a fifty-mile bicycle contest in New York the past week, George Gideon was the only person who completed the dis tance. Time, 3 hours, 13 minutes and 8$ seconds. A saloon-keeper in Brooklyn has been sued by a Methodist minister be cause the minister’s son loafed about the saloon, and he was thereby deprived of his services. The meats in a gallon of oysters should weigh eight and three-quarter pounds, and a gallon of oysters that does not weigh that much* has been stuffed with water and is a swindle. Henry Watterson, writing from Washington, approves the course of Judge Cox and Mr. Corkhill in giving Ouiteau all the rope he wants. It wilj help to hang him. The Y* shaped hull of the polar vessel Jeannette did not save her from be in 2 crushed by the ioe; but it is with a feel ing of joj that we are able to chronicle the safe return of a greater portion of her crew,, Timothy O. Howe, of Wisconsin, the new Postmaster -General, is sixty-five years old.* He was at one time a United States Senator, and at the Chicago Re publican Convention, was one of the notable ‘*so6/’ . Marriageable ladies seeking rank will please .hear' jp. mine! that President Arthur defies the story current ***** abouf-td be married. There ajjyn jt and his heart McMmEAwdsas intro dnoed a btil\ror the assessment and col lection a three per centum tax from 11l till® lf)®o®j|!ii Devoted to Induhtrial Intemt, the Diffusion of Troth, the Establishment of Justice, and the Preservation of a People’s Government. each person or corporation doing busi ness in the United States or Territories on all net incomes above $3,000. Lady Land Leaguers in Ireland are to be arrested, and for their reception, a special jail is being provided. This means that, according to all expectations, there will be, for some time to come, ladies in jail in Ireland for political offenses. Several Cincinnati brewers, disgusted v\ ith the way the "weather has been act hig, are putting in ice machines, and will have ice whether old Boreas wills it or not. Hypothetically speaking, it does look as if Satan and science were going hand in hand. The memory of Guiteau will be per petuated by plaster casts, the product of the sculptor Clark Mills, but who it is that is anxious to adorn their mantel pieces with copies of it would be hard to say. Everyone has had about enough of him already. There are two Congressmen now serving who commenced life as pages in the National House, and a Senator wlios ■ start in life was as a page in the Senate. The Congressmen are Townshend of Il linois and Wise of Virginia. The Sena tor is Gorman of Maryland. Dr. H. G. Glenn, of California, has put 30,000 acres in wheat, and expects to sow 25,000 acres more. That is the "ay they farm, where, when a young married couple start out to milk, they have so far to go and are gone so long that their children bring the milk home. Big farms out there. The Detroit Free Press, a religious paper, says: “In the last 100 years over 4,000 peoplo have been burned up in theaters, and in the same time over 0,000 have perished in church acci dents. ” Where is the good of publish ing such statistics ? It seems that there is everything to shake one’s faith. We believe there is a general demand for a fractional currency for convenience in mailing purposes. Silver is out of the question for this purpose, and postage otn-mps are a nuisance to business houses receiving small orders by mail. It is oi little importance what shape this small currency is in, just so long as it will serve the purpose in question. Congress ought to make some provision at once. The immigrants to this country dur ing November were distributed among the various nationalities thus : England and Wales, 5,823 ; Ireland, 3,284 ; Scot land, 989 ; Austria, 1,454 ; Belgium, 59 ; Denmark, 314 ; France, 529 ; Ger many, 16.900 ; Hungary, 593 ; Italy, 2,978 ; Netherlands, 358 ; Norway, 1,- 294; Poland, 223 ; Russia, 1,721 ; Swed en, 2,870 ; Switzerland, 451 ; Dominion of Canada, 8,807 ; China, 2,711 ; and from all other countries, 228. Senator Call, of Florida, Senator Jones, of Louisiana, and other Congress men, have bought the old Whitehall sold mine, near the Wilderness battle field, in Spottsylvania County, Virginia. Gold was first found there in 1809. The mine was worked by Commodore Stock ton from 1848 until just before the war. It has since been owned by Gilbert R. Fox, of Pennsylvania. Nearly $2,000,- 000 worth of gold has been taken from the mine. The report of the United States Rail road Commissioner says that indications arc that in a short time there will be five separate routes to the Pacific coast, where less than a year ago there was but one. The tendency is still toward in creased railroad development, principally in the South and Southwest. It is be lieved that operations in railroad con struction this year will exceed those of any preceding year. The general con struction of the Pacific railroads is criti cised as not up to the standard. Congress is asked to establish a uniform system of railroad signals. An exchange whose editor seems to have had some experience, says: A doctor will sit down and write a prescrip tion ; time, five minutes; paper and ink. one-fonrth of a cent; and the patient pays sl, $2, $5, $lO, as the case may be. A lawyer writes ten or twelve lines of advice, and gets from $lO to S2O from his client. An editor writes a half-column puff for a man, pays a man from fifty cents to $1 for putting it in type, prints it on several dollars’ worth of paper, sends it to several thousand people, and then surprises the puffed man if he makes any charge. Allen G. Thurman is charged by the Washington Critic with producing a p.mie in the Senate. It says : “ A noise like unto a clap of thunder at sea was heard. Davis, of West Virginia, sprang to his fi&t in amaromeni; Hoar trembled, Vest laughed. Beck looked as though he had heard that noise before, and turned toward the Democratic cloak INDIAN SPRINGS, GEORGIA. room and beheld Ex-Senator Allen G. Thurman with his old bandana in one hand and a good snuff box in the other. Beck told Davis not to be alarmed; it was nothing but Thurman blowing his nose. And the Senate proceeded to business. ” Persons who have unlimited faith in the predictions of Prof. Vennor, a so called Canadian weather prognosticator, will perhaps have that faith somewhat shaken by the perusal of the following, published three months ago in his almanac for 1882 : “December, 1881.—I hardly like the looks of this month, viewed from the present stand point (September 18). It looks ugly, and smacks of cold — bitter, biting cold, north and south, east and west. The month bids fair to be cold and dry rather than otherwise, and this cold may be somewhat proportionate to the heat of the past summer, and extend to extreme Southern and Western points. The entry of the month is likely to bring in winter abruptly in most sections where winter is usu ally expected or experienced. The first week of the month will probably give the first good snowfalls of the season in New York.” It does not seem that he hit it very well that time. In his almanac for 1881, for the same month, he said : “The characteristics of December probably will be those of the preceding two months. This I believe will be one of those Decembers that will cause inquiries of the oldest inhabi tant as to whether there ever had been such a December before. In Canada flowers mav bo discovered in bloom in the open garden, and plowing will be continued almost up to Christ mas.” Now had Vennor transposed the order of this, the hit would have been capital. But then—he didn’t Confederate Bond Text. As considerable interest has been aroused in regard to Confederate bonds, and as the majority of people are un acquainted with their terms, the follow ing wording of a SI,OOO bond is given as a matter of information : “No. 7,403. First Series. “CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, “Loan Authorized by Section 6 of February 17, 1864, Act of Congress. “On the first day July, 1864, the Con federate States of America will pay to the bearer of this boud, at the seat of Government, or at such place of deposit as may be appointed by the Secretary of the Treasury, the sum of one thousand dollars, with interest thereon at the rate of six per cent, per annum, payable semi-annually on the first days of January and July m oaoli year “The Confederate States have, by an act ap proved February 1, 1864, enacted that the principal and interest whereof shall be free from taxation, and for the payment of the in terest thereon, the entire net receipts of any export duty hereafter laid on the value of all cotton, tobacco, and naval stores, which shall be exported from the Confederate States, and the net proceeds of the import duties now laid on so much thereof as may be necessary to pay annually the interest, are hereby specially pledged, provided that the duties now laid upon imports, and hereby pledged, shall hereafter be paid in specie or in sterling exchange, or in the coupons of said bonds. “In witness whereof the register of the treasury, in pursuance of the said act of Con gress, hath hereunto set his hand and affixed the seal of the treasury, at Richmond, this Ist day of March, 1864. E. Apperson, “For register of the treasury.” “Entered, R. B. S. Recorded, J. J. W.” On the left of the bond at a right angle with the body of the bond are the words, “One thousand dollars,” and on the right, “Six per cent, per annum.” Attached to the bond are sixty coupons, payable every six months, from January 1, 1865, to July 1, 1894. The coupons are as follows: “Loan under act of February 17, 1864. The Confederate States of America will pay to bearer thirty dollars for six months’ interest, due January 1, 1865. on bond 7,403, for SI,OOO. Ro. Tyler, Register,” except the dates, which, of course, are all dif ferent, beginning at January 1,1865, and ending \ith July 1, 1894. Concerning Authors. There is an abundance of writers for the press, and to illustrate this fact, I may say that the editor of Harper's Magazine has already a sufficient num ber of accepted articles on hand to serve for two years. Hence should he not re ceive a single fresh contribution his sup ply would last till 1884. The rejected matter, often of interest and real value, which is daily declined by magazines, newspapers, and booksellers, would fill a good-sized wagon. Bonner, of the Ledger , has for some years left orders with his clerks to allow no contribution to be left for examination. He has his regular list of writers, who fill up the space allotted to them, and thus the pa per is made up without any new con tributors. Authorship and writing for the press is now overdone, and there are but few, and these are, indeed, lucky who can make a living at it It is said that the magazine writers are notan enviable class. They may receive SIOO for an article, but it is so difficult to get an article published that they are not much better than a mere newspaper Bohemian. A leading magazinist is said to rate his income from this source at $1,200 a year, which certainly is nothing to boast of. I have read in the newspa pers that a young man who had fitted himself .for journalism by a college ed ucation, had recently engaged to tend bar in a saloon at $8 per week. This may be intended as a piece of humor, but there is a sad truth underlying it. New York Letter. ** Oh vee,” said Mrs. Brown, as she surveyed with indent pleasure the little parlor sideboard, covered with old eh in* and decorated with highly-colored tiles; “ Mr. B. remarked last night that I was becoming quite an atheist,” and the old lady’s countenance fairly beamed with delight as her eyes rested on a 16-cent Japanese tea-pot—Agaric Call. NEWS GLEANINGS. Pineapples are grown at Walatka, Florida. Local option is becoming popular in Virginia. Coiinth, Miss., is showing an interest in silk culture. A sea-cow was recently seen in the bay near St. Augustine. Mississippi is displaying an unusual interest in railroads. Virginia now ranks eighth as a pro ducer of iron ore. In 1870 she was twelfth. Twelve thousand barrels of rosin were disposed of in one sale recently by a Sa vmnah house. The Chief Justice of Alabama is a printer by trade, and formerly worked at the case at Athens, The machinery to be used in improv iig Apalachicola,* (Fla.) harbor has ar rived there and work will begin at once. Col. J. S. Mosby, of Virginia, when he returns from China, will marry a Avell known society lady of Alexandria. Stock raising in Texas offers greater inducements to the capitalist than any other business carried on in the coun. Iry. New Orleans property owners will have to pay a tax of three per cent, to meet the necessities of the city govern ment next year. Asbury Bush, a ferryman, shot and killed a negro named Charlie Nixon, at Warwick, Ga,, for refusing to pay live cents ferriage across the river. Lucien Beard has been pardoned out of the Virginia penitentiary at Rich mond after having served eight of an eighteen years’ sentence for horse steal* ing. Five hundred inhabitants at Ozark, Ala., and not a Smith in the directory. Perhaps the old and well known Jones family have kept them out with clubs. o.a Jnffni-mn TIOS bePD Rfrested at Wilmington, South Carolina, for strik ing Ben. Franklin with a rock and throw ing sand into John Adams’ eyes. A large petition is bnng gotten up in Alabama, praying for the opening of Coosa river to navigation, and beseech ing that no delay be permitted. The convicts in the Tennessee peniten tiary will issue an address to the people of the Stat3, soliciting funds to purchase an organ for their benefit. The State of West Virginia has no indebtedness, the constitution of the State forbidding the creation of any lia bility in the nature of a public debt. In accordance with an act of th , Legislature every child who attends the public schools in Savannah must be vac cinated, otherwise they will be rejected at the re-opening of the schools next month. A company has been chart3red and organized at Rome Ga., to make surveys and estimates with the view of con structing a canal from a point seven miles above the city, sd as to give a fall of thirty feet. With this fall 3,000 horse power will be available for manu facturing. Dalhonega (Ga.J Sentinel: The prep arations for mining by the Loud Gold Mining Company are simply wonderful. The canals are spread over a wide extent of country and mining by the hydraulic process will soon surpass anything ever witnessed in the South. Reports from Hoover Hill gold mine in Randolph county, North Carolina, still continue good. Since the rich strike was made a few weeks ago, it is estimated that the ore raised is worth $50,000, and it still holds out with Splendid promise. This mine is owned and operated by an English company. Bibb county, Ala, has a curiosity in the way of a stalk of ribbon cane. It divides itself into two prongs near the ground. Below the fork the stalk has double eyes. Above the fork, and in cluding both prongs, it is ten feet long and has thirty-two joints. Senator Brown, of Georgia, said in a recent interview that he received no ed -1 ucation to speak of until he was of age At thirty-three he was elected to a Judgeship, and at thirty-seven became Governor. He is now, at sixty-eight, a United States Senator. Gainesville (Ga.) Southron: Gen. Longstrtet will ask the Legislature of Tennessee and North Carolina to give him charters for the. extension of his proposed road into their States. Gen. Longstreet does not pretend that lie can build the road all by himself, but with proper encouragement can and will do so. Atlanta Constitution: Many farmers say they will plant more corn next year. These are 'not the intentions of spring. When the present crop of cotton is safe ly out of the hands of the producers, prices will go up with a venomous bounce, and then our gifted husband men will plow up the corn they have planted and proeeed to scatter their cot ton seed over the face of nature. Natchez (Miss.) Democrat: Yester day Mr. Jerome Converse shot and killed an immense rattlesnake, which measured eleven and a half feet in length and fif teen inches in diameter. This monster snake had nineteen rattles, and its upper fangs were one inch long, and when shot had a large rabbit in its mouth prepara tory to swallowing it. Mr. H. B. Evers, of England, repre senting a Louden syndicate, has recently bought 676,000 acres of land from the State of Mississippi, lying principally in the Yazoo delta, and for which he has paid the State about $50,000. Mr. Evers says that if the will give his syndicate aid they will in th 6 next four years bring to the State 160,000 English immigrants, 60,000 of whom will be voters as soon as naturalized. Orapge county, (Fla,,) Reporter: Eleven years ago, Dr. J. F. J. Mitchell, of Lake Jessup, ate some Oranges and planted the seed. The trees are now ten years old. This year eighty of the seed ling trees from those seeds are bearing, and last week the Doctor sold the fruit from the eighty trees for $462. These trees, as they are ordinarily planned, would cover about one and one-third acres of land —a yield of about $340 per acie, which, for young grove, is not a bad showing by any means. The Doctor has four young groves, and he reports his crop this year 290 per cent, larger than last year’s crop. Mr. J G. McElroy, of Banks county, da., relates the following ocmiranc which happened on his plantation, near Harmony Grove, a few days ago: While his three little boys were standing in the yard a large hawk swooped down and flew away with a chicken in his talons. The boys thinking that his majesty might drop the chicken, followed him some dis tance, when, to their delight, they saw him drop his prey. As soon as this hap pened the hawk commenced circling arouud where the boys and chicken were congregated, and finally lighted on the eldest boy, who was ten years old, and fastened one] talon in the boys chin. The second son went to the rescue, when the hawk caught him in the arm with the other talon, thus holding both the boys at his mercy. The third and yougest, seeing the perilous situation of his broth, ers, drew his knife, went *to work and succeeded in cutting the hawk from his brothers and killing him. both legs were cut to the bone, just above the claw, be fore the boys were released from their dangerous position. After his lordship was dispatched he was found to be a large bird, and measured twenty-four inches from stem to stern. Didn’t Win the Bet. Two friends were discussing the mer its of their acquaintances. Said one of the gentlemen: “Talk about mean men; now there’s old Strassberger. He’s the hardest, driest, meanest old Shylock that ever lived. That man l why 1” And there he stopped as if words couldn’t do justice tc the subject. “You’re mistaken,” said his friend. “ He’s not so bad; even the devil isn’t so black as he is painted. Now I’ll bet you $lO I can borrow SSO of him before night” “ Done !” and the money was put up. On posted the sanguine book-maker to bis intended victim. “ Strassberger, my boy, how are yoti?” arid he slapped him on the back of a faded ready-made coat with a capital as sumption of good-fellowship. “ Ydl, I was all r-i-g-h-t Vot’s de madder mit you?” “ Look here, old fellow, X made a lit tle bet about you just now, ha, ha! It’s a capital joke.” “Urn!” said Strassberger, “ Yelli” Yes, I bet $lO with Smithy that I conld borrow SSO of you to-day.* “ Feefty tollar t” “Yes, that was the amount.” “ Und you bet ten ?” “That’s what I put up.” “ Yell, now look here, my friend” (in a low whisper) “you go straight avay and ‘hedge.*” Rato the rnan who got left when the wine nA short at communion: “I don’t care for the liquor, but I think my soul is of as much account as anybody* s, and, if I don’t lick the deacon by whose negligence I was prevented from carry ing out my religions duty, I’m a pirate. ” Rohekt Bonnkb pays his more than doable that paid any college professor. SUBSCRIPTION*’SI.6I, NUMBER 20 FACTS FOR THE CURIOUS. Ivory is so valuable that manufactur ers who use it save even the powder, which is sold for making jelly. The average life of an English gold sovereign is about eighteen years—mat is, the coin loses three-quarters of a grain in weight in about that length of time. It then ceases to be legal tender. It is said that of the £100,000.000 of British gold coinage 40 per cent, is worn down below the legal rate. Dr. Lewis Baloh, of Albany, in a re view of the medical evidence in the cele brated Billings murder case, alludes to the curious fact that a ball of a given oaliber fired through glass may a hole enough smaller than the full size of the ball before firing to prevent an unfired ball of like caliber passing. Dr. Balch notes seen “ q base ball, thrown with great force and having a rotary twist, make a round hole through an ordinary window light, and when the ball was tried to be again passed through the same opening the hole was neany one-third too small.” The English antiquary, John Aubrey, who wrote about the middle of the sev enteenth century, says that in his time most of the houses in the West End of London were protected against witehes and evil spirits by having horse-shoes fastened to them in various ways. It was the belief that then, no witch- qivw'U o vuiua coma cross the threshola which was protected by the shoe. The fact is that the superstition has been traced about so far back, and then we find it lost in the obscurity of the ages. The custom of nailing horse-shoes for luck to all kinds of sailing craft is still in vogue, and is religiously maintained to be a wise and lucky measure. The supersti tion goes further, by making it fortunate for any one to find a horse-shoe, and the good luck is increased with the number of nails that are attached to the shoe when it is picked up. It is curious to note that Sootfc’s earliest poems were published under the title of William Scott. Still more curi ous to note that he was not aware of this until it was mentioned in “ Taylor’s Sur vey of German Poetry.” Scott wrote to Taylor, to remonstrate. “As to a na tive of Scotland,” he writes, “ there are few things counted more dishonorable than abandoning his own name.” Tay lor’s defence was, “If you had. seen tne title-page of Goetz von Berliohingen, printed in London in 1779, for Bell, 148 Oxford street, you would not have been surprised at my blunder. It states the play to have been translated from the German, by Wm. Scott, Esq., advocate, of Edinburgh. ‘The Lay of the Last Minstrel ’ has the name of Walter Scott, Esq., advocate of Edinburgh, prefixed. That there [should be two Scotte, both advocates, both of Edinburgh, and both skilled in German, at a time when the' study of that language was uncommon; appeared to me improbable, and I there fore inferred that the historic or bap tismal name of this individual was William, and his romantic or Arcadian name was Walter.” Earth-Eating Tribes. M. Grevaux, a French naval surgeon, has lately been exploring the northern parts of South America, more especially m the valley of the Orinoco and its afflu ents. Among other facts of observation, he states that the Guaraunos, at the delta of that river, take refuge in the trees when the delta is inundated. There they make a sort of dwelling with branches and clay. The women light, on a small piece of floor, the Are needed for cooking, and the traveler on the river by night often sees with surprise long rows of flames at a considerable height in the air. The Guaraunos dis pose of their dead by hanging them in hammocks in the tops of trees. Dr. Crevaux, in the course of his travels, met with geophagous or earth-eating tribes. The clay, which often serves for their food whole months, seems to be a mixture of oxide of iron and some organic substances. They have recourse to it more especially in times of scarcity; but, strange to say, there are eager gourmands for the substance, individ uals in whom the depraved taste becomes so pronounced that they may be seen tearing pieces of ferruginous clay from huts made of it and putting them in their mouths. They WDI Sin No More. , An Eighteenth Ward baker, John S. Sapter, put up a job of exceeding cruelty on the small boys who make life pleas ant. for the residents in the vioinity of Fullerton street and Broadway. Every afternoon when the baker drew up at a store, it was the reprehensible custom of the wicked lads to mount the wagon in the owner’s absence, and appropriate whatever samples of pie and ginger snaps came .in their way. One afternoon four of the* boys were at there post when the baker arrived. A half dozen pieoes'were . suspiciously easy to gfet at, but the guileful “ kids H had no thought of wrong in others, and, with many expressions of satisfaction, fled to a contiguous ravine with the pro vendor, and in a remarkably short spaoo of time had coiled round the indigesti ble. Their sensation of repletion was all too brief. The baker had seasoned bis pastry with tartar emetic, and the only reason the young bandits retained their shoes was because they were tied on. The agony ended at last, and four woe-begone, pallid-faced small ones, with stomachs as empty as the promise of a politician, but their hearts filled with intentions of future honesty and uprightness, crept and tottered toward their respective homes. Cleveland Leader.