Newspaper Page Text
me Crawford couu Herald
PUBLISHED WEEKLY.
SMITH & BLASINGAME, Editors & Prop’s
SUBSCRIPTION, 11.00 PER ANNUM.
Official Organ of Crawford County.
KNOXVILLE, GEORGIA.
Entered at the postoffiee at Knoxville,
Ga., as second-class matter.
The Legislature lias passed a new'
stock law.
The repeal of the McKinley bill is now
In order.
We are iikely to have public schools
that will last ten months in the year.
John B. Gordon will be President of
-the 8tate Alliance in le?s than two years.
The next Democratic ticket will be,
Grover Cleveland and James E. Camp-
bed.
Jay Gould has about scooped the
Richmond and West Point
Company.
Is twelve months from now there will
not he an Aillanccman in Georgia who
wU1 <>!>P<*e Gordon._
Tom Reed says the drummers defeated
the “Rads” in the late election. Good
for tile drummers.
Tin. Democracy—more money and
cheaper money, Col. Crowder says less
money ami higher money.
An ovation, such as was nev;.r seen
before iu Augusta, was given General
Gordon l ast Friday by his friend s.
The stock law is now agitating the
public mind. The 6th is for it and the
7th against it on the face of the returns.
Speaker Blount will leave for Wash¬
ington this week prepared to defeit the
force bill and to repeal the McKinley
bill.
Mr. W. A. Hemphill of the Atlanta
Constitution, has been elected mayor of
Atlanta. lie was a full fledged Gordon
man.
Last winter cotton seed averaged
twenty ceuts. This winter they average
twelve ceuts. McCune and the Conger
lard bill did it.
Judce Speer ought to be happy, He
has managed to extort a verdict of guilty
from the jury in the Hall case. The jury
ought to be very unhappy.
It is now the style for a Judge of the
United States Court to knock his grown
daught r down anti kick her across the
room.
Dr. McCune has shook the dust of
Georgia from his feet, and no longer
claims himself a citizen of this State,
fie now once again resides in Illinois.
Uncle Joey Brown still hankers after
“betterments.” We predict that Chair¬
man Huff, of the finance committee, is
in full accord with him. Watch, see.
Eras Gunn told the jury in Macon last
week that lie used to be a lawyer, but
had reformed. The jury decided that it
was the wisest thing he ever did.
Col. CaowDEK, of Monroe, still thinks
■we have have too much money in this
part of the country, and wants to keep
any more from coming.
An election was held in the 6th and
7th districts on last Saturday for stock
law. The “no fence” ticket won in the
6th by 8 majority, but was defeated in
the 7th by 63 majority. Both districts
will contest the election.
Mu. Hulk, of Bibb, in a public speech
in Macon the night before his nomina¬
tion pledged himself, if nominated and
elected, to vote for Gordon. Speaker
Ho well who is opposed to Gordon, ap¬
points Mr. Huff, of Bibb, chairman of
the most important committee in the
House. When behold! Mr. Huff, of
Bibb, at once dcvelopes into a full
fledged anti-Gordon man.
AUGUST BELMONT DEAD.
the millionaire banker and politi¬
cian DIES IN NEW YORK.
August Belmont died at New York
Moudav morning. IIis death resulted
from a severe cold he contracted at the
Lake Horse Shoe. If he had lived until
the 8th of next mouth, Mr. Belmont
‘Would have been seventy four y nr* old.
QUEER INDIANS.
A Remarkable Tribe Surround-
ed by a Natural Wall.
An Interesting Account of the
Supai Canon’s Aborigines.
Ben Wittick, a well-known photo¬
grapher of Albuquerque, New Mexico,
lias been visiting friends in Minneapo¬
lis, and to him the Journal is indebted
for a most interesting and accurate ac¬
count of the Nava-Supais of the Supai
canon. Some time ago lie w.ent to
New Mexico, settling at Albuquerque.
Being a man of adventurous turn of
mind he took a trip up the canon and
located the tribe in the narrow', valley-
Jike enclosure between the mighty
walls of the .Supai canon. Supai is a
name which Mr. Supai gave the canon
himself after having made a trip to
the region. —
On reaching the canon he found the
Indians in the midst of a marvellously
fertile valley, diminutive as it is,
where all sorts of grains and fruits
grow in rank profusion, where there
are splendid climatic influences nearly
the twelvemonth through, and where
a n that tends to build up physical
powers ig at haild . IIe made invegti .
gations, too, info their language, their
rites and ceremonies, their legends,
and inio all the phases of their present
and past history possible, and lie is
confirmed in the belief that they are
1° no way allied to the Aztecs. lie
says, on the contrary, that as far as
can be ascerfained they arc allied to
the Wallapai.
The tribe is a most singular one.
Their valley home has, on either side
great ledges of rocks running up in
benches thousands of feet. In the
valley are groves of cottonwood trees,
and a luxuriant vegetation is seen on
all sides. There are about 245 or 250
in the tribe of the Supai. They live
absolutely alone. They do not inter¬
marry with other tribes, neither do
they mix with the scattering w'hitc
people of the regions round about.
When they arc in need of ferage or
food outside of that which they can
get in their own rich valley, they sally
out, make their trades or purchases,
and return home.
They are monogamists, every man
having one wife and no more. They
do not live in a communal form either,
but preserve the family in its integ¬
rity. The men are a little above the
average height, they are strong and
active, and they are noted for their
skill in climbing the mountains and in
bringing down the game they need.
They arc very shy and suspicious of
Indians from other tribes, and it is
only by the most careful and adroit
means that a white man can approach
them and gain any information as to
their life.
The women are smaller in stature,
very fond of adornment, and given to
fantastic decorations of their faces.
The Supai Indians appear to be far
above many other tribes. in morals.
They look with scorn upon any one
who asks them questions as to their
married relations, holding that this
is no one’s business but their own.
Mr. Whittick found eleven of the
men totally blind. He believes this to
be due to the splitting of the arrows
when the bows were stretched too
taut. Some of the women who would
be seen silting barefooted in front of
their thatched-roof houses have the
most peculiar big toes that ever were
seen on a human being. The toes
were not so very large, but they were
of abnormal width at the ends. In
some ca-es the big toe would be an
inch and a half broad at the end and
very flat and thin.
When Mr. Wittick and his party en¬
tered the canon they found the Supai
very gentle and hospitable in their
aboriginal wav, but very reticent at
the same time. Proceeding down the
canon through the fertile valley, along
which was a slender stream of never-
foiling water, the purest and sweetest
in the land, they reached a magnificent
waterfall, where the silver stream
plunges over a precipice 257 feet in
height and falling in a stream of the
rarest beauty down to the pool below.
Cottonwood trees were felled,lashed
together, and a ladder made in sec¬
tions, the whole 76 feet long, and
down this the explorers climbed in
their exit from the borne of these
strangely interesting semi-savage folk.
The beautiful stream has been utilized
by the Indians in irrigating those por¬
tions of the valley that were sterile and
it appears that for centuries they have
known of this method of aiding ns-
ture.—[Minneapolis Journal.
A Famous Kentucky Campaign.
I met a Kentucky politician in town
the other day, and heard fr>m him the
story of Kentucky’s famous ‘“huckle¬
berry and nightshirt” campaign. The
Democratic candidate for Governor in
that campaign was a plain man who
lived among the plain people, and was
supposed to be acquainted with their
habits. His Whig opponent, on the
other hand, was a wealthy, proud old
man, who lived at ease and enjoyed
the luxuries of life. In the course of
the campaign it was urged before rural
audiences that the Whig candidate
actually wore frilled nightshirts.
There was a prejudice against sucli a
garment among the rude countrymen
of those days, and the charge was
pressed with much persistence and
humor. Finally the two candidates
dined together at the house of a farmer
and were served at the same moment
with huckleberry pie.
Now huckleberries were the only
small fruit grown in that part of Ken¬
tucky, and it was a matter of course
that if any pie were served it should be
huckleberry pie. This, however, was
unknown to the Democratic candidate,
and, after praising the pie, he inno¬
cently asked its ingredients. The look
of grave surprise that came to him
through the spectacles of his hostess
warned him that he had blundered,
but he hoped that his mistake might
pass unnoticed. This, however, was
a vain hope, for that very day, in joint
debate, the Whig candidate exhibited
his frilled nightshirt to the crowd,
proudly proclaimed it the work of a
loving wife, and then held up to con¬
tempt the man who could not recognize
huckleberry pie on sight. After that
the huckleberry pie and nightshirt
campaign was hotter than ever, but at
the election Kentucky set her seal of
disapproval upon the trivialities of
fashion by electing the Democratic
candidate.— [New York Star.
Smallest Church ia England.
While in England Rev. Dr. Lyman
Abbott of Brooklyn visited (he small¬
est church in England, at Nast Dale
Head. And the parson's wife gave
him some facts about the church which
Dr. Abbott labels “important if true,”
such as that the age of the church is
unknown, that its endowment fund is
fifty cents and a bottle of wine and a
loaf of bread for the communion,
which carries back the age of the
church, she oj ines, to the year 1000 at
least; that the entire population of the
parish is fifty-two, men, women and
children, and the average attendance
fifty-two; that the vicar’s wife is or¬
ganist and bell-ringer, and sweeps and
dusts and performs in general all the
Levitical functions of the temple, which
is 41x16 feet in size; that the vicar’ s
salary—stipend, they call it—is $325,
paid out of the missionary funds of
the established church; that the pre¬
vious vicars have been drinking men
and no honor to their cloth; and that
the total contributions of the worship¬
pers in the parish amounted for the
three years of the previous vicar’s
charge to less than fifty cents.—[Chi-
ca g Q Herald,
-
Cultivation by Artificial Light.
The experiments in the cultivation
of plants under the electrical light, re¬
cently made by the botanical depart¬
ment of Cornell University, have given
some curious and interesting results,
and results which are in some respects
confirmatory of somewhat similar ex¬
periments not long ago reported from
Russia. The first and most noticeable
effect of the treatment is an enor¬
mously increased rate of growth. The
plants which are lighted seem to work
day and night, and to “run very much
to leaf.” Vegetables shoot up very
quickly, and peas in a few short weeks
are two or three times as tall as those
planted at the same time in daylight.
In the case of seeds and fruits of any
kind, however, the results are entirely
different and the plants which had
grown slowly and by daylight were
ahead. It was observed that in every
instance the reproductive powers of
the plant were strongly affected, be¬
ing sacrificed to mere foliage and
rapidity of increase in general size.—
fBostou Cultivator.
SEA 01 IMS.
An Ingenious Way of Obtaining
Rare Pelts.
fhe Fur Hunters Shoot Their
Prey From Lofty Derricks.
It is not generally known that some
of the most expensive fur-produciug
animals are killed ofl’ the coast of the
new state of Washington, and it is re¬
markable that the extent of territory
where these animals are taken is so ex¬
tremely limited, being only from Da-
mon's Point at the northern entrance
to Gray s harbor up the coast to Point
Greenville, a distance of about twenty-
four miles. The animal referred to is
the sea otter, the fur of which is man-
ufactured into the robes of the poten-
tates and princes of the Old 4\ orld.
l nlike that of the seal, the fur of
the sea otter requires no plucking of
hair or coloring; in fact, the most 1
valuable skins are those which are
speckled throughout with a silver-
lipped hair, which is koQwu as the
silver-tipped fur, the addition of this
hair adding 25 to 50 per cent, to the
price of the skin.
There are now several hunters en¬
gaged in killing sea otters at the place
referred to, and the modus operandi
of taking them is very interesting.
The hunters build for themselves
derricks about forty feet high by tak¬
ing three slim poles or pieces of tim¬
ber, each about forty feet in length,
and, bolting them securely together at
one end for the top. they spread them
about twenty-five feet apart at the
bottom, giving the appearance of a
huge tripod. These are set on the
ocean beach, about midway between
high and lovr tides, the foot of the
poles being embedded in the sand
from two to three feet. The structure
is then thoroughly braced,aud a ladder
built to the top by nailing pieces at
convenient distances crosswise on the
inland.
About eighteen inches below the top
of the tripod cross timbers are secured
to the legs and upon these, cross tim¬
bers a floor from four to five feet
square is laid: and on the oceanward
and two adjoining sides walls are built
up three and a half to four feet in
height. On the land side a door is
constructed to allow the hunter easy
ingress and egress to and from liis
-crow’s nest.” On the top of the tri¬
pod, which extends about 18 inches
above tfhe floor, a scat is constructed
and around the inside of the wall a
row of shelving is placed.
At low tide, when the wind is pro¬
pitious, the hunter hies himself to his
crow’s nest, armed with a good pair of
glasses, a Sharp’s rifle, a lunch, and
for six long hours he scans tlm line of
the ocean just outside of the breakers,
where he most expects his game to ap¬
pear. When the tide first begins to
flood, his range is about 600 yards, but
as it runs in the range is shortened to
200 or 300 yards. Even at these lat¬
ter distances it requires close calcula¬
tion to know just howto shoot to over¬
come the rise and fall of the ocean
swell aud the effect of the wind upou
the bullets.
It is said that not one out of 100
shots of the best marksmen is effect¬
ive. When the tide is full the derrick
stands in the midst of the breakers,
and a land lubber feels a little squeam¬
ish looking down from the dizzy
heights on the rolling waters below.
Each hunter marks liis bullets with
a mark known to the otlier hunters,
and when an otter is found on the
beach the first duty of the finder is to
look for the bullet and ascertain who
is the rightful owner, for this sign is
respected among the hunters as sacred¬
ly as marks and brands are among
stockmen.
The season for killing sea otter ex¬
tends from May to October, and so
scarce is this game t>ecoining that four
a season is considered doing well by
miv hunter. In fact, some pass the
season without taking any.
The hunters- have a rule among
themselves—which is strictly observed
—that only one derrick can be allowed
within a range—i.e., about a half mile,
thus giving the whole beach a regulari¬
ty of appearance not elsewhere observ¬
able.— [Once-a-Week.
In the reign of Queen Elizabeth
clergyman whose benefice did not
ceed $100 per annum wa9 allowed
follow a trade.
Imposing Uic i.utu .sentenc
“How does a judge feel when hj
sentences a man to death?” has ofte*
been asked.
“Speaking tor myself, I caa say it
was the greatest trial of mv life,” sa ;,j
a well-known jurist, in answer to the
query of a Chicago News reporter
“I shall never forget that moment to
my dying day. I doubt if the po*
wretch I sentenced felt any worse than
I did. And yet I had to do it. There
was no help for it. The man had
been found guilty of murder, and a
jury had said that he must expiate hi 1
crime upon the scaffold.
.*The 8ce nc dwells in my mind yet.
j t was a beautiful morning, aud the
grim, uncomfortable court room pre-
sented a cheerful, sunny appearance
a ] mogt a rebuke from nature for the
temerity of man in saying that a hu-
man be i n£ r sbou ld be deprived of life,
The criminal was a young man, barely
twenty-four years old, and as he
s t ood up at my command to receive
the death sentence he fixed his eyes on
Ine witb such a look of despair that
m y nerve nearly forsook me. How-
ever, I managed to articulate the
words that told him ’ liis days were
numbered. He did not say anythin?,
or faint; it would have been a relief if
he had.”
It wa9 in the spring of 1882 that
Judge Sidney Smith, who was then
bolding Criminal Court, was called
upon to sentence a man to be hanged.
It was a most peculiar case and a rare
one. The prisoner, a man named
Gales, pleaded guilty to murder. “Do
you know that on that plea I can sen¬
tence you to be hanged?” asked the
judge. “I do,” answered the prisoner.
“Then let. us hear the evidence,” said
the Court. If took just an hour to got
in all the evidence, and Judge Smith
told Gales to stand up.
“Have you anything to say?” asked
Judge Smith.
“Nothing,” was the answer.
“Then I sentence you to be hanged
by the neck until you are dead, on the
21st day of March,” said the Court.
“Take him away.”
It is a rare occurrence that a pris¬
oner is sentenced to death upon a plea
of guilty. calm
Judge Grinnell was not the
person he usually is when lie imposed
the death sentence upou William E.
Purdy. He fingered the papers upon
his desk in a nervous mauuer, and his
voice was a shade less steady than
usual as he fixed the day for Purdy’*
execution.
A Luminous Sea.
During the whole of the present
year, as well as the last five months of
1882, the whole of the sea of VeuicehaJ
been as one vast expanse of phospho¬
rescent waves whenever washed to
even the slightest extent by the winds.
Formerly this luminous appearance
has only' been noticed at intervals of
about ten or fifteen years, then only
from the beginning of summer until
about the end of harvest, and in places
abounding with sea grass. Now every¬
thing seems changed, the whole surface
of the sea or gulf appearing as a sea
of pale white fire as soon as darkness
sets in on a windy night. In calm
nooks the mere drawing of a stick or
cane back and forth through the water
is sufficient to give the effect of an
electric flash, the light dying ont and
again returning with the ebullitions of
the water.
A flask tilled with the water emits
no light until shaken violently; the in¬
troduction of a lead pencil or small
stick, however, will cause the fluid to
glow with greater intensity than any
amount of shakiug on the part of tltf
experimenter. Strained through a
fine cloth, the water loses all of it*
peculiar properties, they having been
imparted to the cloth,which now Sink¬
ers and glows all over the entire sur¬
face like the Bpot where a damp match
has been scratched in the dark.
After the last-mentioned peculiarity
w r as noticed scientists made examma-
tion of cloths used in such operation 3 *
and were rewarded for their pain* hf
the discovery of the light-giving tni4g f *
a minute worm or maggot, scarcely
the one-seven-hundredth of an inch
length, each how-shaped and rer T
-
lively. Each of these little creature 3
is provided with twenty-two man 1 ** 38
instead of feqt, eleven on each
and has eleveu luminous rings aroanl
his tiny body. Persons living on tiie
shores of the gulf say- that when u<
waters sparkle more than usual it b 1
sure sign of a storm.