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MERINO SHEEP.
History of Their Introduction in
the United States.
American Merinos Far Ahead
of the Original Stock.
American Merino sheep history is
one of strange vicissitude—of wild
and unreasonable inflation and still
more unreasonable depression. The
first importation ot which there is any
authentic record was that of a fine
Merino sheep sent as a present to a
Mr. Foster of Boston. So far from
comprehending the value of the gift he
had the animal slaughtered and ate
the mutton. He pronounced it “deli¬
cious” ; it certainly was costly, for he
soon after paid a thousand dollars for
another sheep of the same kind. The
incidents attending the advent of the
breed to these shores are typical of its
career ever since. During the first
decade of the present century thou¬
sands of fine Merinos were brought
from Spain, and sold at
prices ranging from three
hundred to one thousand dollars each.
Then came the noiMntercourse acts,
the embargo, and the war of 1812-14
between the United States and Eng¬
land which gave an enormous stimu¬
lus to the woolen industry. Fine wool
was sold as high as three dollars per
pound and the sheep brought corres¬
ponding prices. Five years after the
end of the war those sheep or their
immediate descendants were a drug
in the market at a dollar each. With
the American ports reopened to com¬
merce, a flood of foreign textile fab¬
rics was poured . to the country over-
whelming the American manufactures
of woolen goods. The woolen mills
were closed, the operatives thrown
ont of employment were driven to
farm work,increasing to a still greater
extent the surplus of farm products
for which there was no sale. Wool,
except for the limited amounts used in
household industries, was without a
market, and sheep had only a nominal
value. Flocks which had been the
wealth and pride of their owners
were slaughtered olf. Nor have the
bitter experiences of those two de¬
cades been wholly without parallel in
later times. The last forty years have
witnessed fluctuations in sheep hus¬
bandry, which if not as violent were
as needless and as preventable as those.
Meantime tho Merino sheep, beset
by wild animals, worried by dogs,and
tossed in the whirlwinds of political
contests, has kept on adding millions
of dollars to the national wealth, fur¬
nishing employment to thousands of
tusy hands supplying both food and
clothing. The breed has not only
survived all vicissitudes without de¬
preciation, but has improved to such
an extent that, the American Merino
of today is as far ahead of the origi¬
nal stock as a Rhode Island Greening
or Northern Spy is ahead of a wild
crab-apple. This is wholly due to the
enterprise, intelligence and “pluck”
of American breeders and flockmas-
ters. Holding on to their flocks
through evil and good report—often
at serious pecuniary loss—they have
strictly maintained the purity of the
breed, and advanced it in excellence,
until the American Merino is beyond
question the best fine-wooled sheep
in the world, A perfect, typi-
cal sheep is level, broad-backed, with
a well-developed, symmetrical body,
standing on good strong legs, the
whole covered with a true Merino
fleece, a year’s growth of which
should weigh, unwashed, as high as
even twenty-five pounds from ewe and
forty from a ram. A well-bred
American Merino is a bold, upstand¬
ing animal. He has a stately grace,
inherited from a long line of ances¬
tors which would seem to have caught
something of it from the high-born
Spanish dames who held exclusive
possession of tho breed for so many
centuries. The American Merino im¬
proves every ether fine-wooled sheep
with which it is crossed. In Australia
they are eagerly sought because they
add density to the open but otherwise
admirable fleeces of the countless
flocks which graze there.— [American
Agriculturist.
Gargoyle—I should think that wo¬
men could find more congenial em¬
ployment in banks than anywhere
else. Mrs. Gargoyle—Why? Gar¬
goyle—Because money talks.
The First Martyr of (lie Revolution.
All of the school histories and
popular text-books give us to under¬
stand that on April 19, 1775. at Lex¬
ington, Mass., the first blood of the
American war of independence was
shed. Within the last few years his¬
torians, who have been giving tho
matter much attention, claim West¬
minster, Vt., ns the scene of the first
tragedy in that memorable conflict
and one William French as the victim.
Vermont at that time was a part of
New York. The people of the Ver¬
mont district were badly worked up
over tho royalist question, and had
decided not to allow the regular ses-
sion of the King’s court to be held in
Westminster that spring. Accordingly,
when the court officers wore sent they
were accompanied by a body of royal
troops. The people were exasperated,
and assembled in tho Court House
to resist. When the court officials and
troops arrived orders were given for
the people to vacate the room, This
they refused to do, when the troops
of George III. crossed the grounds
and fired into the little band of patri¬
ots, “wounding some,” the accounts
say, “and instantly killing William
French, who was shot clean through
the head with a musket ball.”
French was buried in the church-
yard at Westminster, and a stone
with the following inscription was
erected to his memory:
“In memory of William French
Who Was Shot at Westminster, March
ye 12th, 1775,- by the hand of the
Cruel Ministerial tools of George ye
3d at the Court House at 11 o’clock at
Night, in the 23 year of his Age.”—
The Pitcairn Islanders.
Of course, everyone hasdieard of the
remarkable colony on Pitcairn island,
the little rock in the Pacific Ocean,
less than three square miles in extent,
where the mutineers of the Bounty
took refuge in 1789 with the women
they had stolen from the island of
Tahiti. There many of their descen -
ants live today, one of the happiest
and most contented communities in
the world. Pitcairn island became too
small to hold this prolific people, and
in 1856 the entire population 11 was re-
moved to Norfolk island, far west of
their native home. A part of them,
however, yearned fov Pitcairn and re¬
turned to the little rock that gave them
Birth. There are, therefore, now two
settlements of the descendants of the
mutineers, one on Norfolk island and
one on Pitcairn.
A more wonderful story was never
told than that of those sunny-hearted
people who, having their origin in
crime and bloodshed, have been shield¬
ed from nearly all the temptations that
beset the world, and are now a pros¬
perous Christian people, simple mind¬
ed, pure and upright. No such thing
as a jail has ever existed at Pitcairn
island. The world seldom hears from
this handful of people, living in (lie
far southern Pacific Ocean, but it is
always glad to learn tidings of their
welfare, and when news does come it
rarely fails to report the continued
prosperity of this remarkable settle¬
ment. A while ago the Pitcairn Isl¬
anders celebrated the hundredth anni¬
versary of the landing of their fathers
on Pitcairn rock. Dearly as they love
their little home, it is probable that
some of them will be compelled to
emigrate before many years, because
its population is again becoming
crowded.— [Goldthwaite’s Magazine.
Sand Tornadoes.
A German physician who has passed
several winters iu southern Italy
claims to have discovered the cause of
the sick headaches and respiratory
troubles so often experienced during
the prevalence of a protracted sirocco.
Having noticed that those symptoms
are observed even without a percepti¬
ble increase of temperature, lie con¬
structed an apparatus enabling him to
demonstrate that the atmosphere of
southerly gales is impregnated with
countless particles of fine sand. On
tha limitless plains of the Sahara those
gales oftgn acquire the force of a hur¬
ricane, and whirl up sand-clouds
to a height of several miles; from
there the upper air-currents carry
them across the Mediterranean, aud
even across the eastern Alps, since in
the valley of the Danube southwest
storms are often accompanied by a
curious haze, hanging for days about
the hill-tops like the smoke of a forest-
fire.— [Belford.
LIKE CORN IN A GRANARY.
HUMAN BODIES PILED UP IN A
MEXICAN GRAVEYARD.
A Ghastly Sight in tho Strangest
Burying Ground of tho World—
Mexican Burial Customs.
The strangest burying ground of the
world is here at Guanahuato, writes
Frank G. Carpenter to the New York
World. I have visited the most curious
graveyards on record, but I have never
Been anything that compares with the
horrors I saw to-day. Imagine if you
can the bones of a hundred thousand
human beings torn to pieces and piled
one on the top of another like so much
corn in a granary. Put all ages and
sexes together. Tear them limb from
limb and mix the mass of skulls, legs,
arms and ribs together so that the bony
fingers of one runs into the hollow eyes
of its neighbor and the parts of the differ¬
ent skeletons lose themselves in tho vast
pile of this vaulted granary of bones.
The cemetery of this city of Guana¬
huato is situated on the top of a high
hill overlooking the town. I entered by
its wide gate and found myself sur¬
rounded by great walls in a court which
contained perhaps five acres of ground.
The walls of this court were about eight
feet thick, and as I examined them I
found that fchsy were in fact made up of
pigeon holes about three feet square and
six feet deep, some of which were open
and others of which were closed with
marble slabs on which were printed the
na mes and virtues of the dead who were
shelved away within. There were thou-
3 ands of these pigeon holes, and my guide
showed me a card giving the rates.
From it I sec that these holes are rented
out to the bodies of the dead, and the
guide tells me that the most of them arc
taken lor about five years, after which
the bones of the deceased are taken out,
the pigeon hole is cleaned and it is ready
for the next occupant. It costs $25 for
the use of one of these pigeon holes for
five years, and this seems to be the short¬
est term for which they are leased. A
man who wants one perpetually can have
it by paying $100, and if he cares to
crowd his whole family into the same
bole he can have it for the lump sum of
Leaving . tne court I was next con¬
ducted into the great storehouse for tho
bones of the dead after their leases have
expired and they have been ousted by
their landlords from their tenements
above. There I saw great piles of skulls
and other pieces of skeletons jum¬
bled together in all sorts of shapes
and mixed up into in' one heterogenous
mass of bones, rising a slanting way
the floor of the tunnel at an angle
of forty-five degrees to the roof. Every¬
thing was jumbled together in the of great the
democracy of death. The bones
old and young were piled in rested and on in one the
another. The feet of men
skulls of women, and I saw a great-toe
in the grinning teeth of what may have
once been a beautiful girl. About an¬
other skull the bones of an arm were
thrown almost caressingly, and legs and
arms, whole and in bits, were piled up
one on the top of another like so many
stones, and the whole, ghastly as it was,
looked more like the piled up Indian
corn in a crib than anVtbing else.
I had my camera with me in (his
vault, and I wished to take a photograph
of it. There was, however, no place on
which to rest the camera, and I suggested
to the guard of the cemetery that he go
get a board. lie at once picked up a
coffin trom a little pile which contained
the mummies of babies, and taking the
mummy out held it under his arm while
he propped the coffin on end and made
it stand level by putting a thigh bone
from the great heap under one corner.
Upon this I rested my camera and suc¬
ceeded in taking a very fair picture. Be¬
fore I left I took a picture of and this another man
with the mummy in his arms
of him and his brother ghoul holding up
the municipal coffin, in which all the dead
of this town have to brought to the grave¬
yard. There are no hearses in this moun¬
tain city, and the town has fixed
rates for the rent of its coffins.
These coffins are so big that another
coffin can be put inside of them, and
they are carried on the shoulders of the
bearers up the steep hill. As soon as
they enter the cemetery the coffins are
placed on a ledge or stone table and are
opened, for the purpose, it is said, of
seeing that not more than one corpse is
buried iu one coffin, and that the ceme¬
tery gets its full fee for every
corpse. perhaps the only
Mexico City is
place in the world where the street cars
are the hearses. A funeral costs $500 if
at all respectable, and in tho case of for¬
eigners the expenses run up into the
thousands. This is especially so when
it is desired to take the bodies out of
the country. If the friends of the dead
are not posted all sorts of extravagant
charges are imposed upon them, and the
estate of a Kansas millionaire named
Smith, who died here lately, paid
$2000 for expenses here. Among the
charges was one of $800 for embalming,
and I heard of a case yesterday in which
a Mexican embalmer or doctor charged
$5000 for preparing for shipment
the body of a Frenchmm who died
here.
Next year all students in St. Peters¬
burg, Russia, are to have their heads
measured.
Brazil’s exports for 1891 are estimated
at $200,000,000.
The Stars and Stripes.
The American flap—the stars and the
glorious red, white and blue—has under¬
gone several changes within the past six¬
teen months The admission of North
Dakota, S >uth Dakota, Washington and
Montana recently, added tour stars to the
blue field of the flag; then came Idaho,
and now the latest new state, Wyoming, the
claims a star in the constellation of
union. The flags of the government are
always changed on the Fourth of July,
and bow the spangled banner of forty-
four stars is the standard of the union.
Here are the terms announced of the president’s ihc
latest order, as to army: flag
“The field or union of the national
in use in the army will, on and after
July 4, 1891, consist of forty-four stars in
six rows, the upper and lower rows to
have eight sta's, and the second, third,
fourth and fifth rows seven stars each.”
Cash and Credit Accommodation.
Clerk—“Here is a lot of goods for Mr.
Smith ought to be sent out to-day.”
Proprietor—“Can’t do it. Too mauy
orders ahead.”
“They are not for the Mr. Smith who
pays cash, but the Mr. Smith who has an
account here—good deal overdue, too.”
“Oh! hire an extra team and take them
out .”—Street <6 Smith's Good News.
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Its advantages for practical instruction, aud espe¬
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as the OUftrifcy law secures Hospital it superabundant with its 700 materials bed^, and 20,000
great patientBannually. Students have hospital fees to
no
pay and special instruction is other daily given at. THE Bed¬ Next
side of THE SICK, as in no institution.
college session begins October 19th, 1891. For cata¬
logues or information address
Prof. S. E. CBAILEE, HI. D., Dean.
tJrP. O. Drawer 2M. NEW ORLEANS, LA.
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