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THE MAORIS. Garb and Customes of the New Zeland Aborigines. Primitive Abodes, Military Equipments, Etc. A Maori salutation consists in the rub¬ bing or pressing of noses, which is the etiquette of welcome in that island. The Maori whare, of native house, usually consists of one large room, destitute of furni^ire except mats, although Euro¬ peans sometimes make a gift of a table or chair, which is prized'as a luxury. The ornamentation, where there is any, is that of idols, sometimes carved in the wood of the house itself, and staring hideous¬ ly at the people or at each other in a way to give the impression of a set of occupants besides the human ones. The houses are usually little more than huts or hovels, made of rushes, or perhaps of stalks of the toi, bound tightly with fibres, and roofed with grasses. This roof, carried out in front of the hut, gives a sheltered en¬ trance. The door is low, often with a small window at the side. The fire is on the floor, and cooking, sleeping and the plaint of infants go on together; but the more luxurious houses have a separ¬ ate cooking hut. The mats are import¬ ant features, since much sleeping is done by the Maoris, who are indolent by na¬ ture. The men, usually scout, are tat tdoed all over, but the women only in the lower part of the face. The Maori lady is usually attired in true native fashion, but in the towns some have ac¬ quired the improvements of their Euro¬ pean sisters, with kid gloves end boots and gowns that trail. Those who go to church are especially startling in their union of native and imported rigs. The Maoris are, on the whole, a race with many fine qualities, bright, affectionate, good-humored, grateful, generous, hospitable beyond the con¬ ception of white races, brave, often al¬ most insensible to pain, but with no in¬ dustry or persistency. Of course with their proverbial honesty they yet have some thieves, and with their usual gentleness they have the insolent and menacing. These need to be met with perfect cour¬ age and imperturbability, for they con¬ sider anger a sign of a weak character. They are not an ill-looking race beneath their tattoo, the women usually having fine eyes and a profusion of tangled black hair. The Maoris navigate their canoes by paddling instead of rowing. They use a paddie with a long diamond-shaped blade. The banks of the rivers are often girt with acacias and willows, and canoes abound on them. One part of the military equipment of a Maori war¬ rior which formerly struck strangers was the war trumpet, fully six feet long, and so skilfully constructed as to be beard for miles. In the Maori mythology the gods are children of Rangi and Papa (Heaven and Earth), who created all things. Of course there are malignant gods who must be appeased. Tlie great religious power is tapu, or that of making things sacred by the touch of the chief; and as records of what has thus been made sa¬ cred are not kept, the consequence! are sometimes serious for unintentional vio¬ lators of it. Miss Butler, the author of a volume on the Maoris, says that when the story of the Prodigal Son was told to some Maori girl;3 the part which touched them most was that when the poor lad had spent all his money no man gave unto him. “Sev¬ eral of the girls cried, and there were deep sighs and notes of disap¬ probation,” truly characteristic of the hospitable Maori nature. The Maoris are quick, says the author, in repartee and illustration, and an old woman crit¬ icising the length of a sermon said: “My calabash is full. "Why give me any more water? It can only run over.” Yet, with all their affection and frank¬ ness, the Maori children seemed to Miss Butler to have no idea of obedience. The babies are carried slung on the backs of the mothers in shawls, like the pappooses of our-Indians. The women have their ears pierced for wearing or¬ naments, of which the shark’s tooth is a favorite; but some, with an inventive¬ ness not found among their civilized sisters, have been known to utilize the hole in the ear by sticking into it a to¬ bacco pipe, so as to have it ready for use.— Harper's Weekly. Twenty-five per cent, of those who rob and steal are detected. The Luscious Banana. Ordinarily in this country bananas are eaten raw, but in the tropical countries, while the natives eat them in like fashion, a more delicate, and, it is said, a more healthful mode of eatiag them is in vogue. The soft, ripe fruit, beaten to a cream, with a sufficiency of Amon¬ tillado sherry, forms a very delightful appetizer and is the favorite way of eat¬ ing the banana in certain parts of the West Indies and on the Africau coast. Taken in moderation on first rising in the morning bananas are said to be pre¬ servative of health, and in this respect are in marked contrast with other tropi¬ cal fruits which are detrimental, rather than otherwise, to continued good health. An intoxicating drink is made from the banana, and on account of its astringent properties is of considerable medicinal value. In Africa, and proba¬ bly in other places also, the banana, and the kindred tree, the plantain, are in a very large measure the sole dependence for the food supply of the natives. The banana, when ripe, contains 74 per cent, water; of the twenty-six re¬ maining parts twenty are sugar and two glutten,- or flesh-forming substance. It is not in itself a perfect food, but re • iT. the addition of , mtro- ., quires some more genous material, as lean meat. The pulp of the banana, but more often of the plantain, isoftimes squeezed through a sieve and formed into loaves, which, when ripe, will keep a very long time. In the dried state it has a resem¬ blance to bread, both in taste and com¬ position, but the ripened pulp is saccha¬ rine, and not farinaceous. The fruit, however, of the banana, is the least valuable part of the tree. The fiber, which in some countries is permit¬ ted to go to waste, is of value. Through¬ out Central America and the continent of Africa it is used, with only the prep¬ aration of drying, for sewing thread and fishing nets. The threads are of silky fineness, and it was thought that as an article of commerce it would pay to im¬ port it in large quantities. A firm in Bradford, England, having got posses¬ sion of some of the fiber, wove a quanti¬ ty of handkerchiefs from it that for del¬ icacy of finish and strength were unex¬ celled. With a silky sheen and remark¬ ably fine web, such articles -would have obtained a ready market, but it was found that the mode of obtaining the fiber by the natives was too slow, and until ;ome machine avas invented to strip the fiber quickly the small quantity would be of practically no use. At Panama the rarest and most delic¬ ious of the banana species has its home. Small and ruddy in color, it is known vulgarly as the thumb banana, and on account of its delicate flavor is much prized even there. It does not bear transportation well, although it may often be found in the markets of Chica¬ go and New York. Crossing the Isth¬ mus by the line that connects Panama with Aspinwali, the natives at the vil¬ lages along the route make a habit of coming to the train decked in primitive fashion, with garlands of flowers around their necks and flowers in their hair, and disposing of fruit. Here the thumb banana may be eaten in its perfection.— Alta Californian. Market Value of Some Reptiles. A St. Louis dealer in curiosities says that such things as tarantulas, centi¬ pedes, and Gila monsters have a market value and are quoted regularly by curi¬ osity dealers. People collect everything, and there is always a demand for these reptiles. A good specimen of the taran¬ tula or ceniipede, alive or mounted, brings $1. Live specimens are sent in boxes only by express, as they are not allowed to go by mail. What is more surprising is the sale that exists for Gila monsters. Zoological gardens want them, of course, but there are private parties who also order them. Fine specimens bring from $5 to $10. They come from Arizona, where the Indians collect them for the dealers. This is the most repulsive-looking reptile to be found in any part of the world. Cheering a Precocious Invalid. “Charles Egbert Craddock’s” early invalidism compelled her to lead a quiet indoor life. ‘ ‘I couldn't engage in the sports of the other children,” says the distinguished novelist, “and sometimes I was so disappointed and ^uneasy that my mother used to find it nec.s ary’to comfort me. One of her favorite meth¬ ods was to say, ‘Never mind, my dear, if you can’t do as the others do, you can do one thing which they can’t do; you spell Popocatapetl, and they can’t.’ ” can BUENOS AYRES. A South American City of Great Wealth: Odd Regulations Necessitated by its Narrow Streets. A returned traveler from the Argen¬ tine Republic talks in this wise with a reporter for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “About 150 miles up the Rio de la Pla¬ ta is Buenos Ayres, a handsome city of about 500,000 inhabitants. We have an idea here that away down in South America it is almost uncivilized, but we are very much mistaken. The people there dress better than they do here and in about the same fashions, the city has the best street car service in the world, and there are banks there with $20,000, 000 to $30,000,000 of capital, The city is laid out in regular blocks, the streets running north, south, east and west, and whenever a street car gets to a corner the conductor blows on a trumpet made from a cow’s horn. At first it is very funny to hear these horns tooting in all directions. The streets are to narrow—only 30 feet „ wide—that ,, , the ,, w conductor of a car cannot see an ap¬ proaching car on a cross street until he gets almost to the corner; so they keep up their signals on the horns. “There is plenty of money in Buenos Ayres, and ju-t now the country is booming. Capitalists are buying large tracts of land from the government, and selling ranches to emigrants who come to raise cattle. A great many English capitalists are in business there, and there is a great deal of wealth in the city. I had to have my money changed to Argentine paper money, and I found that there were hundreds of these money changing banks in the city, The Ar gentine notes are discounted from 40 to 50 per cent, in favor of American gold, and from 25 to 35 per cent, in favor of American greenbacks. If you are a stranger and they know it they will fleece you for the money changers arc a set of robbers. t t It is said that more cattle are raised in the Argentine Republic than in the whole United States. It is their great¬ est enterprise. The country is like our western prairies, admirably adapted to grazing and blessed with one of the best climates in the w r orld. Their horses, too, are magnificent animals, and in Buenos Ayres they have race tracks where the prizes are enormous and the gambli g very brisk. “They haven’t any timber, though, and have to buy all their carts, agricul¬ tural implements, etc., from European firms. Why, there isn’t a manufactory in the city. There are great opportuni¬ ties for American enterprise in this coun¬ try. Still, there are drawbacks. On account of the narrow streets -wagons cannot be used, and all the hauling is done in huge carts drawn by tandem teams with the cart tongue strapped to a saddle on the wheel horse’s back. You can imagine how busy people are in Buenos Ayres when carriages and carts are not allowed to drive up a street and return the same way. The law compels them to go around in a circuit to re¬ turn and so avoid the passing of vehicles on the streets. It is done to avoid blockage of the streets. Then, too, the docks on the river are not large enough. The English capital¬ ists have got their warehouses on the only available ground near the docks, and as the government does not allow goods to remain on the quays after landing they have a monopoly. The consequence is that merchants have to have their goods taken to the beach in small boats from the ship, while those carts are driven into the water alongside and loaded up. It is amusing to go along the shore and see these carts with just the horses’ heads above water. It is slow work unloading a ship that way. Where -we would do it in one day it takes thirty days in Buenos Ayre3. “About 1300 miles from Buenos Ayres there is an abundance of the best timber, but no one has yet had the en¬ terprise to utilize it. I have been think¬ ing of starting a mill near there, but have not yet decided. It takes a great deal of money to go into a manufactur¬ ing business there. ‘ ‘Although the distance in a direct line from New York to Buenos Ayres is about 5000 miles, our log showed we had sailed 7200 miles on our return trip, which lasted fifty-eight days.” A Plymouth (Conn.) dwelling still oc¬ cupied was erected in 1677. The Cattle of Holland. The Netherlands, including Friesland, Groninger, Zeeland, Gelderland, Overys sel and Flanders have, from remote an¬ tiquity, been celebrated for fine milking breeds of cattle. The now celebrated IIolstein-Friesian cattle have, under this name—probably a misnomer—attained wide celebrity in the United States,from the immense messes of milk which they give. The Flanders cow was selected by Guenon as the representative of the best milking qualities in a cow. There are variations in color of the several varieties of the Netherland cat¬ tle, from nearly black to nearly white, and white -belted, The Holland cow and the Friesian—now called the IIol stien-Friesian in the United States—are probably the best representatives of the improved varieties of a race of cattle that in the days of Cmsar, were required to pay tribute to the Roman Empire, partly in kind, and probably for the reason of their superiority—in those long past days—in milk and flesh. It will not be necessary to enter into a discussion of the merits of the several sub-divisions of the race, It is enough to say that in the early days of the de¬ velopment of the Durham in England— now called Shorthorn—it was probably due to a cross of the Netherlands cattle that the Shorthorns today show such wonderful heredity in the occasional production of great milkers, as well as deep-milking families of Shorthorns where this heredity has been carefully preserved.— Pro.irie Farmer. Eat Before Yon Brink. “A large proportion of intemperance in the use of stimulants,” philosophized a physician, “may belaid to the light breakfasts eaten by most people. Break¬ fast is the most important meal of the day, and sufficient importance is not at¬ tached to it in the majority of house¬ holds. After the long fast enforced be¬ tween supper or late dinner and seven or eight m the morning, a person in good health should feel hungry; and it is at this hour of the day that the heartiest meal may be eaten with the least proba¬ bility of bad results. The man who starts out in the morning after having eaten a hearty breakfast will seldom, unless suffering from chronic indiges¬ tion, experience any of the discomforts which might follow a similar meal at any other time of day. The chances are he will also enjoy a happy frame of mind all day; whatever be bis custom, he will find himself with an excellent appetite. Eating creates appetite. The very opposite resulrs will follow the other course in this matter, arid the man who has not had a good bieakfast will not en¬ joy a good dinner. I have treated a good many cases of habitual drunken¬ ness, and in a great many of them have found that the evil practice of tippling was begun to satisfy a gnawmg, faint sensation in the stomach in the morn¬ ing, which was nothing more or less than disguised hunger.”— Buffalo Ex press. Commercial Value of Walnut Trees. The black walnut usually commences to bear nuts at about 10 years of age. The nuts have some commercial value in them. They make food for hogs, and are very valuable for fuel. They can be gathered in great quantities in •’ the fall, and thrown in open sheds, or piled on an open platform made of boards, hull and all; after they get dry they make a fuel equal or superior to our ordinary soft coal, and will make a good substi tute for coal in places where it cannot be obtained. The stumps, logs and crotches have now,and will in the future have a great value for cabinet-making and veneering purposes. The tops make excellent cord-wood. Every black walnut tree, grown with plenty of room to develop, can, in 50 years,at the present price of the lumber, be made worth at least $50; in 100 years, $100; in 200 years, $200; in 400 years, $400. The nuts for fuel and other purposes will pay good inte:est on the land they occupy .—Prairie Farmer. Land Worth $8,000,000 an Acre. The highest price over paid for a piece of Chicago real estate was that given by Mr. H. II. Kohbaat for the northwest corner of Dearborn and Madison streets. The dimensions of the property are 20 by 40 feet, and the price paid was $150, 000, which is equivalent to $7500 per front foot, $187.50 per square foot, $1.30 per square inch, or about $8,000, 000 acre. The comer is considered one of the finest in the city. — Chicago Jour* nal. Good-By. When we have said good-by to some dear friend, Or watched receding loved ones from the shore— Then turned away, since we could do no more To make their happiness complete, we send Hosts of good wishes after, as wo wend Our homeward way; beg Heaven to out¬ pour Its blessings on the ones that we adore, And God his gracious favor to extend, f There are so many foes! Land, sea and sky Have now unheard-of dangers! But this cry Disturbs the heart in t ilenco. We defend Anxieties from curious eyes, pretend To be indifferent, teem cold and shy, When with our trembling lips we say “Good-by I” HUMOROUS. Speaking of wagers, what was it Al¬ phabet. The lady who never marries should be named Ida Kline. The ideal beau is not always a wom¬ an’s beau-ideal. This Union ought to bo able to bear 42 states with fortitute. Tho sheriff is no longer a cute chap— an execute chap, we mean. A Chinaman’s head may be called a comet because it has a Celestial tail There aro 3000 telegraph operators in Loudon and they are all living on “tick.” Another good cure for insomnia is to have the nurse sleep up in the attic with the baby. A lady refers to the time she spends in front of her looking-glass as “moments of reflection.” What horse did Lady Macbeth ride be¬ fore she bade a fond adieu to her wicked husband? The nightmare. “And how did Bifkins become in¬ sane?” “By absorption. lie slept for three nights beneath a crazy quilt.” De Smith—It seems almost impossible to impress anything on Poeyboy’s mind. Travis—I don’t see why. It is soft enough. Dyspeptic traveller (surveying tho menu card): Oh, that I had the wings of a dove! Waiter (promptly): Pigeon pot-pie for one. A traveling man who found cause for complaint at a European hotel remarked that the bill of faro should be cullod the bill of unfairness. “Let’s sec,” said the judge to Hie thief, “the ring is eighteen carats fine; the penalty is eighteen dollars fine, and you can set this down as final.” A kiss is said to be something which “comes by male but never by post.” This is an error; we have often known kisses to come by the gatepost. “I married for love, ” said one. “I married for money, I admit,” said another. “What did you mnrry for, aunty?” “I married forever.” Cholly (jocularly)—“Take that pen¬ cil out of your mouth.” Billy—“Say, mister, who owns this mouth?” Cholly —“A syndicate, probably, judging from its size.” v • Miseries of trade (Druggist awakened at 2 a. m.)—What do you wish? Voice (at the door)—If you’ll Jet me look in your directory to see how to address this letter I’ll buy the postage stamp of you. Brightly—What would you do, doc¬ tor, if you had a bad cold? Doctor (crushingiy)—I'd consult a reputable physician, sir! Brightly (calmly)—I don’t suppose you could tell me where I could find one, doctor, could you? If fun you’d be at, go, joke with a cat And play the old game with its paw; But joker, beware! If you value your life, Don’t j ke with your mother-in-law. Two Views of Innkeepers. Shenstone’s lines, says Joel Benton in the New York World, will forever stand out as the most notable ascription to the old-time tavern. They have often been found fault with, we are told, as being a disparagement to ordinary hospitality and of human nature, but they appeal by their pathos to one side of our com¬ mon experience. Shenstone says: Who’er has travelled life’s dull round, Where’er his stages may have been, Mav sigh to think he still has found The warmest welcome at an inn. It is almost cruel to parody so touoh ing a eulogy, but it is said a wag who once saw these lines appropriately dis pi aye d at a hotel wrote beneath them the following stanza: Whoe'er has travelled much about Must very often sigh to think That every host will turn, you out . Unless you've plenty of the chink.