UKV. OIL TALMAGR.
THE NOTED 1)1 VINE’S SUNDAY
DISCOURSE.
Subject: “The Dissipations of tlie
Race Course,”
Ts.xr: “Hast thou given the horsesfrhngth?
Hast thou clothed his neck with thunder?
Ho pawetli in tho valley, and rejoiecth; he
gooth on tumbet the armed moD. He mith
arnoug tin* trumnets, ha. hn! and hesmollefh
the battle afar off, the thunder of the can
tains. and tho shouting.”—Job xxxix., 19,
21. 25.
We have recently had long columns of in
telligence from the race course, aud multi
tudes flocked to the watering places to wit
ness equine competition, and there is lively
discussion in all households about the right
ami wrong of such exhibitions of mettle and
sneed, and when (here is a heresy abroad
♦hat the cultivation of a horse’s fleotnoss is
an iniquity instead of a commonable virtue
—at such a time a sermon is demanded of
every minister who wou'd like to defend
public morals on the one hand, and who is
not willing to see an unrighteous abridg
ment of innocent amusement on the other.
In this discussion T shall follow no sermonie
precedent, but will trive independently what I
consider the Christian and common sense
viewof this potent, all absorbing and agitat
ing of the turf.
There needs to be a redistribution of cor
onets among the brute creation. For ages
the lion has been called the king of boasts.
I knock off its coronet and put tho crown
upon the horse, in every way nobler, whether
in shape, or spirit; or sagacity, or intelli
gence. or affection, or usefulness. He is
semihuman, scale. and known how to reason on a
small The centaur of olden times,
part horse and part man. seems to be a sug
gestion of the fact that the horse is some
thingjnore than a beast. Job in my text
sets forth his strength, his beauty, his maj
esty. the panting of his nostril, the pawing
of his hoof and his enthusiasm for tlie bat
tle. What Itosa Bonhenr did for the cattle
and what Landseer did for the dog Job with
mightier pencil does for the horse, Eighty
eight times does the Biblespeak of him. He
comes into every kingly possession and into
every great occasion and into every triumph.
It is very evident that Job and David aud
Isaiah and Ezekiel and Jeremiah and John
were fond of the horse. He comes into much
of their imagery. A red horse—that meant
war. A black horse—that meant famine. A
pale horse—that meant death. A white
horse—that meant victory. Good Mordeeai
months him while Human holds tbe bit. The
church’s advance iu the Bible is compared
to a company of horses of Pharaoh’s chariot.
Jeremiah cries out. “How ennst thou con
tend with horses?” Isaiah says. “The horse’s
hoofs shall bo counted as flint.” Mirian
claps her cymbals and sings. “The horse and
the rider hath he thrown into tbe sea.” St.
John describing Christ as coming forth from
conquest to conquest, represents Him as
seated on a white horse. In the parade of
heaven the Bible makes us hear the clicking
of hoofs on the golden pavement as it says.
“The armies which were in heaven followed
Him on white horses.” I s’nould’not wonder
if the horse, so banged, and bruised, and
beaten and outraged on earth, should have
some other place where his wrongs shall be
righted. I do not assert it. but I sav I
should not be surprised if after all St. John’s
description of the horses in h°aven turned
out not altogether to be figurative but some
what literal.
As the Bible makes a favorite of the horse,
the patriarch, and and the prophet, and tlie evan
gelist, the apostle stroking his sleek hide
ami patting his rounded neck, and tenderly
lifting his exquisitely formed hoof, and
listening with a thrill to the champ of his
bit, so all great natures in all ages have
spoken of him in encomiastic terms. Virgil
in his Georgies almost seems to plagiarize
from this description in the text, so much
are the descriptions alike—the description
of Virgil and the description of Job. The
Duke of Wellington would not allow any one
irreverently to touch his old warhorse Cop
enhagen, on whom he had riddpn fifteen
hours without disr- ranting at Waterloo,
and when old Copenhagen died his master
ordered a military salute fired over his
grave. John Howard showed that he did
not exhaust all his sympathies in pitying the
human race, for when sick he writes home,
“Has mv old chaise horse become sick or
spoiled?” There is hardly pathetic any passage of
French literature tnore than the
lamentation over the death of the war charg
er Llarchegay. Walter Scott had so much
admiration for this divinely honored crea
ture of God that in “St. Ronan’s Well” ho
orders the girth slackened and the blanket
thrown over the smoking flanks. Edmund
Burke, walking in the park at Bcaconsfteld,
musing over the past, throws his arms
around the wornnut horse of his dead son
Richard, and weeps upon the horse’s neck,
the horse seeming to sympathize in the mem
ories. Rowland Hill, the great English
preacher, was caricatured because iu his
tamil v prayers he supplicated for tho recov
ery of a sick horse, but when the horse got
well, o,ontrary to all the prophecies of tho
farriers, the prayer did not seem quite so
much of an absurdity.
But what shall I say of the maltreatment
of this beautiful and wond°rful creature ot
God? If Thomas Chalmers in his day felt
called upon to preach a sermon against cru
elty to animals, how much more in this day
is there a need of reprebensive discourse!
All honor to the memorynf Professor Bergh.
the chief anostio for the brute creation, for
the merev he demanded and achieved for this
king of beasts. A. man who owned 400!)
horses, aud some say 40,009, wrote in the
Bible, “A righteous man regardeth the life
of his beast.” Sir Henry Lawrence’s care of
the horse was beautifully Christian. “Ha
says; “I expect we shall lose Conrad, though.
I have taken so much caie of him that he
mayeonio in cool. I always walk him the
last four or five miles, and as I walk myself
the first hour, it is only in the middle of tho
journey we get over the ground.” Th© Ftt
riok Hhopherd in his matchless “Ambrosial
Nights” speaks of tile maltreatment of the
horse as a practical blasphemy. I do not
believe in the transmigration of souls, but I
epunot very severely denounce the idea, for
when I see men who cut and bruise and
whack and welt aud strike an d maul and out
rage and insult the horse, that beautiful
servant of the human race, who carries our
burdens and pulls our plows and turns our
thrashers and our mills and runs for our
doctors—when I see men thus beating and
abusing and outraging that creature, it seems
to me that it would be only fair that the
doctrine of transmigration of souls should
prove true, and that for their punishment
they should pass over into some poor miser
able brute und be beaten and whacked and
cruelly treated and frozen and heated and
overridden—into an everlasting stage horse,
an eternal traveler on a towpat'n. or tied tc
an eternal post, in epizootics! an eternal winter, smit
ten with eternal
Oh, is it not a shame that the brute crea
tion. which had the first possession of out
world, that should be last—the so maltrc-:i!ed fowl and by the rac
came in the fh
created on tho fifth day, the horse and tho
cattle breathed on the morning of the sixeu
dav and the human race not created until
the even | ng or thoslxth day? It might to
he that If any man overdrives a herse, or
toons him when he is hot, or recklessly
drives a nail Into the quick of his hoof, or
rowels himlo see him prance, orso shoos
him that his fetlocks drop blood, or puts a
c -llar on a raw neck or unnecessarily
clutches his tongue with a twisted bit, or
euts nfr his hair until lie has no defense
against the cold, or unmercifully abbreviates
the natural defense against inscctilc annoy
ri nee—that snob a man as that himself ride! ought
to bo made to null and let his horse
hut not only do our humanity and our
Christian principle and the dictates of Cod
demand that we kindly treat the brute
creation, and especially the horse, hut I go
further and say that whatever can be done
for the development of his fleetness, and-his
strength, and his majesty ought to be done.
We need to study his anatomy and his
adaptations, T am glad that largo books
have been written to show how he can be
bejit managed, and how hts ailments can he
cured, ambwhat his usefulness is. and what
his capacities are. It would bo a shame if
in this age of tho world, when tho florist
has turned the thin flower of tho wood into
a gorgeous rose, and the pomologist has
changed the acrid and gnarled fruit of tho
ancients into the very poetry of pear and
peach and plum and grape and apple,
and the snarling cur of the orient has
become the great mastiff, and the miserable
creature of tho olden times barnyard has be
come the Devonshire, and the Alderney, ami
the Shorthorn, that the horse, grander than
them all, should get no advantage from our
science, or our civilization, or our Christian
ity. Groomed to tho last point of soft bril,
liance. his flowing mane a billow ot' beauty
his arched neck in utmost rhythm of curve*
let him be harnessed iu trappings
and then driven to the furthest goal oatbins of ex
cellence, and then fed at luxuriant
and blanketed in comfortable stall. Tho
long tried and faithful servant of the human
race deserves all kindness, all care, all re
ward. all succulent forageand soft litter and
paradisaical pasture field. Those farms in
Kentucky and in different parts of the North,
where the horse is trained to perfection iu
fleetness and in beauty and in majesty, are
well set apart. There is no more virtue in
driving slow than in driving fast any more
than a freight train going ten miles the
hour is better than an express train going
fifty.
There is a delusion abroad in the world
that a thing must be necessarily good and
Christian if it is slow and dull and plodding.
There are very few goo i people who seem to
imagine it is humbly pious to drive a
spavined, galled, glaudered, spring halted,
blind staggered jade. There is not so much
virtue in a Rosinante as in a Bucephalus.
We want swifter horses, and swifter men,
and swifter enterprises, aud the church of
God needs to get off its jog trot. Quick tem
pests. quick horses? lightnings, quick steams; why
not quick In the time of war the
cavairv service does the most execution, and
as the battles of the world are probably not
all past, our Christian patriotism demands
that we be interested in equinal velocity.
We might as well have poorer ■ guns in our
arsenals and clumsier ships in our navy
yards than other Nations as to have under
artillery our cavalry saddles and before our parks of
slower horses. From the battle of
Granieus, where the Persian horses drove
the Macedonian infantry into the river,
clear down to the horses on which Philip
Sheridan and Stonewall Jackson rode into
the fray, this arm of the military service
has been recognized. Hamilcar. Hanni
bal. Gustavus Adolphus, Marshal Ney were
cavalrymen. In this arm of the service
Charles Martel at the battle of Poitiers beat
back the Arab invasion. The Carthaginian
cavalry, with the loss of only 700 men. over
threw the Roman army with the loss of 70,
000. In the same way the Spanish chivalry
drove back the Moorish hordes. The best
way to keep peace in this country and in alt
countries is to be prepared for war.and there
is no success in such a contest unless there
be plenty of light footed chargers. Our
Christian patriotism and our instruction
from tho word of God demand that first of
all we kindly treat the horse, and thea after
that, that we develop his fleetness and his
grandeur and his majesty and his strength.
But what shall I say of the effort being
made in this day on a large scale to make
this splendid creature of God, this divinely
honored being, an instrument of atrocious
evil? I make no indiscriminate assault
against the turf. I believe in the turf if it
can be conducted on right principles and
with no betting. There is no more harm in
offering a prize for the swiftest racer than
there is harm at an agricultural fair in offer
ing a prize to the farmer who has the best
wheat, or to the fruit grower who has the
iaigest pear, or to the machinist who pre
sents the best corn thrasher, or in a school
offering a prize of a copy of Shakespeare to
the best reader, or in a household giving a
lump of by sugar all to the best behaved by youngster. all
Prizes means, rewards means.
That is the way God develops the race. Re
wards for all kinds of well doing. Heaven
itself is called a prize, “the prize of
the high calling of God in Christ Je
sus.” So what is right in one direction is
right in another direction. And without the
prizes the horse’s fleetness and beauty and
strength will never be fully developed. If it
cost 81000 or 85000 or 810,000 and the result
be achieved, it is cheap. But the sin begins
where the betting begins, for that is gam
bling, or the effort to get that for which you
give no equivalent, and gambling, whether
on a large scale or a small scale, ought to be
denounced of men as it will be accursed of
God. If you have won fifty cents or 85000
as a wager, you had better get rid of it. Get
rid of it right away. Give it to some one
who lost in a bet, or give it to some great
reformatory institution, or if you do not like
that, go down to the river and pitch it off
the docks, You cannot afford to keep it. It
will bum a hole in your purse, it will burn a
hole in your estate, and you will lose all that,
perhaps 1000 times more—perhaps you will
lose all. Gambling blasts a map or it blasts
his children, generallv both and all.
What u spectacle when at Saratoga, or at
Long Branch, or at Brighton Beach, or at
Sheepsheud Bay, the horses start, and in a
flash $>50,000 or 8100,000 change hands!
Multitudes ruined by losing the ■toot, others
worse ruined by gaining the bet; for if a man
lose a bet at a horse race’, he may be dis
couraged and quit, but if he win the bet he
is very apt to go straight on to hell!
An intimate friend, a journalist, who in.
the line of his profession investigated this
evil, tells me that there are three different
kinds of belting at horse races, and they are
about equally mutuals,” leprous—by “auction pools,”
by “French by what is called
‘•bookmaking”—all gambling, all bad, all
rotten with iniquity. There is one word
that needs to be written on the brow of every
poolseller as he sits deducting his three or
live per cent., and slyly “ringing up” more
‘ickets tbau were sold on the winning horse
—a word to be written also on the brow
:>f every bookkeeper who at extra in
tueement scratches a horse off of tho race,
tad on the brow of every jockey who siack
■tis pace that, according to agreement, an
>ther may win, and writing over every
udges’ stand, and writing on That every board o
. ne surrounding fences. word ;
“swindler'.’’ Yet thousands bet. Lawyer;
bet. Judges Of courts bet. Members of th
Legislature bet. Members of Congress bet.
Professors of religion bet. Teachers undstt
-erintendenta of Sunday-scho >ls, I am told.
>e,. Ladies net. not directly, but through
ugents. Yesterday aud every day they
SCHLEY COUNTY NEWS.
they gain, they lose; ami this summer, while
the parasols swing, aad the hands clap, and
the huzzas deafen, there will bo a multitude
of people cajoled and deceived and cheated,
who will at the races go neck and neck, nock
and neck to perdition. by all drive
Cultivate tho horse means,
him as fast as you desire, provided yqu do
not injure him or endanger yourself or
others, but bo careful and do not harness the
horse to the chariot of sin. I)o not throw
your jewels of morality under tho flying hoof,
Do not under the pretext I)o of have improving the
herse destroy a man. increasing not your catalogue name
put down in tho ever
of those who are ruined for both worlds
py the dissipations of the American race
course, They say that an honest racecourse
is a “straight” track, and that a dishonest
3SSSS track surrounded by betting und
race men
betting women and betring customs is a
straight track— I mean straight down! Christ
asked iu one of sheep?” His gospels, “Is not a man
better than a I say, yes. and he is
better than all the steeds that with lathered
flanks ever shot around tho ring at a race
course. That is a very poor job by which a
mau in order to get a horse to come out a
full length ahead of some other racer so
latnes his own morals that he comes out a
whole length behind in the race set before
you not realize tfco fact that there is a
mighty effort on all sides to-day to get
money without earning it? That is the curse
of all the cities; it is the curse of America
the effort to get money without earning it
and as other forms of stealing Hre not re
spectable, I they go this into these gambling prac
tices. preach sermon on square old
fashioned honesty. I have said nothing
3S3 !£: ST
against their prostitution. Young men, you
go into straightforward industries, and
haV6 better bvelihood, and you
will have larger permanent success than you
can ever get by a wager, but you get in with
aome of the whisky, rum blotched crew
which I see going down on tho boulevards,
SWATS–J. aud you -MeUS
damned. •
Cultivate the horse, own him if you can
to owa Him, R,ll the sf>eod hn Las.
if he have any speed in him, but be careful
which way you drive. You cannot always
tell what directive h man is driving in by the
way his horses head. In ray boyhood we
rode three miles every Sabbath morning to
the country church. We were drawn by two
line horses. My father drove. He knew
them, and they knew him. They were
friends. .Sometimes they loved to go rapid
ly, and he did not interfere with their hap
piness. He had ail of us in the
wagon with him. He drove to the country
church. The fact is that for eighty-two
years he drove in the same direction. The
roan span that I speak of was long ago un
hitched, and the driver put up his whip in
the wagon house never again to take it down,
but in those good old times I learned some
ihing that I never forgot—that a man may
admire a home, and love .a horse, and be
proud of a horse, and not always be willing
to take the dust Christian, of tho preceding vehicle,
and yet be a an earnest Christian,
an humble Christian, a consecrated Chris
tian, useful until the last, .so that at his
death the church of God cries out us Elisha
exclaimed when Elijah went up with gal
loping horses of fire, “My father, my father,
the chariots of Israel and the horsemen
thereof.”
TKE LABOR WORLD.
Of 10,000 British seaman, sixty-six are l03t
at sea every year.
New York City’s street cleaning foremen
are to ride bicycles.
Union baiters announce that Union labels
in hats must be sewed.
A strike of thirty-seven boys in a mill at
Taftville, Conn., led to 1400 men being
thrown out of work.
Tire great cotton mills destroyed by fire at
Warren, R. I.. are to be rebuilt with greater
capacity for turning out cotton cloths. ,
The employes of tho Taftvillo (Conn.)
mills have received notification of a general
increase of from live to ten per cent, in
wages.
the A Brooklyn railway corporation has set by
sum of 810,000 to lie given out in re
wards to employees who give tho best
service.
The Union of United Salespeople is agitat
ing against Anns in Yorkville, New York
City, who keep open late hours without ex
tra compensation to their employes.
The puddle mill of the Bethlehem (Penn.)
Iron Company will soon begin to run
double turn on both day and night shifts.
A large number of men will be given work.
Tbe gold beaters of New York City and
Chicago are out on strike for an increase of
wages of 85 a “beating,” or 812 a week, an
increase of 81.80 a beating and 84.50 a week.
The Indiana window glass factories have
started their fires. Laborers, skilled work
men and oflloo help go back at increased
wages over last year of from seven to fifteen
per cent.
A considerable portion of the cloth hat
and cap making industry has been trans
ferred from New York City and other cities
to country districts on account of strikes in
the trade.
The ’longshoremen of New York City are
being organized by the Knights of Labor.
They receive twenty and twenty-five cents
organized. an hour, against forty cents when they were
brass-making Birmingham, England, is the greatest
in town in the world, and it keeps
steady employment an average of 7000
brass workers. Paris, Franco, comes in a
good second.
Girl waiters in Smith A McNeil’s, tho big
gest uniform restaurant in New York City, wear The a
of white aprons and caps,
former force of girl waiters refused to wear
them and quit work.
Sixteen artesian wolls wilt be drilled near
HazletoD, supply Penn., by a coal-mining collieries. company
to wator to its engines and
The drought this season has caused distress
in the mining villages.
During tho past two weeks over 100 addi
tional freight braketnon have boen employed
by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company,
preparatory to the expected heavy truffle
during the remainder of the year.
The “cost-price restaurant” which is to be
operated by a leading New Jersey manu
facturing firm for its workmen is to bo inau
gurated on the theory that well-fod people
can do better work than starvelings.
Miss Persky, an expert, said, before the
So
wages paid to girl coatmakors are from three
to ten cents a coat. (Seven coats a day was
hard work aud few women are able to ac
complish such a task.
The convention of the American. Federa
tion of Labor will I c held in New York City
December 9 to 22. Delegates representing will be a
million working men and women
present. Eminent leaders in the American
Federation of Labor regard the re-election ol
Samuel C.ompors as President of that body
‘
as certain.
IVORY IN THE FAR NORTH*
WONDERFUL STORT THAT A
MINER BRINGS FROM ALASKA.
-—
Thousands of Tusks of Mammoths,
He Says, Lie Witli Tlielr Bones
Under Arctic Snow and Ice.
Q EORGE ly enced most returned miner, graphic HUGHES, from who and Alaska, has an interost- recent- experi- gives
a
ing account of a discovery made by
himself that may prove of fabulous
«- 1 win r in ' Icite iat T 3t
in that strange, iar away country,
With several adventurous companions
Mr. Hughes forsook the Kotteuaimin
ing country of British Columbia a year
for prospecting . tour for gold
ago a in
Alaska, being led on by the tales told
b y J returned miners. Their experi- ^
ences were commonplace enongh, nn
til at the end of a perilous trip down
Yukon River Hughes was taken so
^ village * hftt the the right h , adc of tho , am P !lt ft uativ which , e
on river,
was called in t heir tongue Kwaqui
huilette. Heprevaileduponhiscom
panion8 *1 to leave him and continue
their . trip. . . Ihis . was the ,, urgent, ,
more
because the season was advancing, and
if further delay was made every op
E° rt r‘1 40 r*o« r t would to lost.
Finally the friends yielded aDd left
him in the village.
Jn j.jj e couree 0 f some weeks Hughes –
, began to , . learn a great , many of . the ,, T ln
dians ways, succeeded in partially
mastering their language, and was
their traditions. Curtained From by tbe.recital his descrip- of
tions, this tribe was one peculiarly
different from those of Alaska which
have come in contact with the new
settlers. Hughes pays the highest
tribute to their character, saying that
as a rule they are pure minded, char
itable and forgiving. Two faults are
never condoned by them, lying and
stealing, both being punishable by
death.
Mr.JHughes’s attention was attracted
to the ivory ornaments which the na
tives wore. Even the rude spoons and
drinking cups were fashioned of the
same material, and were kept in daily
use in almost every household. In
every village of Alaska, and the cus
tom prevails among the Indians of the
Western States, the totem poles are
an important feature, and have varied
significances beyond that of marking
the respect and veneration of some
great and distinguished chief or rela
tive. Mr. Hughes noticed among
things that these totems were profuse
ly decorated with ivory. The ravens
at the top had ivory beaks, and the
eyes of the historic figures underneath
were of the same material.
So impressed was the prospector
that he began questioning the natives
to learn the source of their sujoply.
The mystery became greater by their
stories that the ivory came from a
mine several days’ sleighing from
there and over a route beset by innu
merable dangers. The Indians went
further into their explanations, and
said that an ancestor of the tribe had
discovered the place, and such quanti
ties of ivory had been obtained that
their wants had been supplied ever
since. Later, when Hughfes became
convalescent, a totem erected to tho
memory of this old chief was shown
him. He describes this as a most
magnificent piece of handiwork. As
they translated the meaning of the
different figures with which the token
abounded he saw that it was not a
mere idol form of worship), but a his
torical record. Each figure bore
some relation to a historic event. One
of these, representing a little squat
ting man with fearfully dilated eyes
and monstrous mouth, had an elongat
ed nose, horrible in aspect, which
Mr. Hughes recognized at once as the
task of some pre-glacial ivory-bearing
animal. With this knowledge he con
cluded that tbe mystery of the “ivory
mine” was solved, upon the theory
that the natives had despoiled the
body of some mammoth; yet the rea
soning was not satisfactory, because
of the great quantity of ivory in their
possession, which could not have been
furnished with a hundred tusks.
Mr. Hughes thought so constantly
on the subject that he became eager
to solve the mystery, and, seeing his
eagerness and gathering from his talk
some idea of the real value of ivory,
the natives themselves yielded to his
desire to make the trip. Fully a week
was spent in making the preparations
for the journey. when the
It was late in the year
party set out, Mr. Hughes acting as
chief and an aged man, who said he
had madejpart of the journey, as guide.
For two weeks the party pursued their
journey, during which they passed
within the Arctic circle. It was dau
gerous to an extreme, They had
perilous eneouuters with wild ani
mals aud made difficult crossings of
seams, rifts and hummocks in the ice
and snow. They finally reached the
spot ^hich was at the foot of a moan
taid, which, Mr. Hughes thinks, was
about twenty -fivo miles from tho
Yukon River, in ft different route,
The whole party suffered from expo
sure, particularly Mr. Hughes, who
was threatened with a return of his
old comjflaint. parties into small
After dividing the
bands at this spot two days were spent
in searching .. for . tho deposit. . T It
was
finally discovered by the old guide,
who, with Mr. Hughes, had mounted
upon a big hummock of snow to take
a survey of the surroundings. Di«
rectly in front of them was a large
square depression.
“Hal-kwa-su J” “There it is!"
cried the guide. The descent was
quickly made, and it was found that
the artificial hole was now filled with
snow, packed as hard and solid as ice.
The work of clearing out the place
occupied Boveral days, and than a
marvelous sight was spread before
them.
Hundreds and thousands of tusks,
white and gleaming with frost, were
to be seen scattered through the skele
tons of gigr.ntio beasts. A close in
spection showed the remains wero
those of the old mammoths, and it was
easy to imagine that all wero stand
ing on the former battle ground of
these ancient beasts. This was evi
denced by the fact that in some in
stances the tusks of the animals would
be found buried in the skeletons of
each other.
Mr. Hughes estimates that there
must have been several tons of ivory
in sight, and by digging around the
edges of the excavation it was seen
that the bodies wero evidently scat
tered over a large plain. He tried to
find a perfect skeleton, but failed,
some of the bones either being broken
or missing from each. The party took
considerable ivory back with them,
and Mr. Hughes disposed of his share
very advantageously upon a return to
civilization.—New York Herald.
SELECT SIFTINGS.
A machine paints wire fences.
The thermometer was invented ir
1620.
Beaver hats wero worn in the twelfth
century.
An Alabama father has taught all
his children to read with their books
upside down.
A Baptist preacher in Georgia re
fuses to baptise converts except in
running water.
People in Madison County,Kentucky,
who have paid their taxes are entitled
to be married free by the Sheriff.
Frank Melrose, a supernumerary at
one of the New York theatres, knows
all of Shakespeare’s plays by heart.
Geigersville, Ky., is the birthplace
of a boy who was an inveterate to
bacco chewer before he was a year
old.
The Khedive of Egypt has a four
horse set of harness for use on state
occasions which is mounted in gold
and cost $11,000.
An Arkansas hunter has a tiound
that will catch his tail in his teoth and.
roll down a hill taster than any other
hound in the pack can run.
A West Virginia man is so peculiar*
ly affected by riding on a train that
he has to chain himself to a seat to
prevent his jumping out of the car
window.
A Minnesota girl of fifteen can dis
tinguish no color, everything being
white to her, and she is compelled to
wear dark glasses to protect her eyes
from the glare.
Nail biting, according to a French
doctor, is hereditary. Almost one-third
of the French school children bita
their nails, and the girls are worse
than the boys.
Perhaps the largest camellia in ex
istence is at Plinitz Gastle, near Dres
den, Germany. The tree is twenty
four feet high and annually produces
about 50,000 blossoms.
A one-armed man who swings a
scythe as fast as anybody, and a one
armed woman who maintains her fam
ily by taking in washing, are two o
Palmyra’s (Me.) smart people.
A rolling stone, left inside a sehoon
er when she was built, was rocentlj
found to have worn a groove nearlj
through the planking. Its timeb
discovery probably saved a vessel ant
crew.
E. E. Lander, of South Paris, Me *
can attire himself in a broadcloth co‘t
aged forty, boots twenty, breeds*
thirty, carry a pocketbook 130 ye ,r ®
old, and a gun about the same, fnd
ride on old. a wagon wheel seveaty-jJ®
years
Of the four Nationalities makins u P
the population of Great Britain t nL *
Ireland, the Scotch are the heaviest
men, the average weight bang*
Scotch, 165.3 pounds; Welsh-63- 3
pounds; English, 155 pounds; trisb,
154.1 pounds.
The most magnificent gift ove.'jU v611
by a subject to a sovereign Yas Middle
ton Court iu the county :>£
sex, erected by Cardinal Vyolsey, ftmf *
ST liplomatic judgment pre^nt it be et
G- m to Henry VIII., >vben
came apparent that the splendor o
the building Uadawakenet that grasp*
ing sovereign’s cupidity
A Costly Auiolraph.
When Adelina Patti favors! anyone
uowadavs with extremi her riitogrJpn, df skee
writes it at the top a
of paper. Her reasonfor this 1 9
.
once when she signed/t in subsequently too nii<
of the sheet, it w<s
coupled by the recipient MJGfpfomfee wth the to p
nifieant sentence, )0i), and P
at sight the sum 4 ( s.-Now !<**
sented at her banter i
Herald.
