Deworralic alan
Bellefonte, Pa., May 20, 1898.
WAR.
Iam War. The-upturned eyeballs of piled dead
men greet my eye,
And the sons of mothers perish—and I laugh to
see them die—
Mine the demon lust for torture, miine the devil
lust for pain,
And there is to me no beauty like the pale brows
of the slain !
But my voice calls forth the god-like from the
sluggish souls at ease,
And the hands that toyed with ledgers scatter
thunders round the seas ;
And the lolling idler, wakening, measures up to
God’s own plan,
And the puling trifler greatens to the stature of a
man.
When I speak the centuried towers of old cities
melt in smoke,
And the fortressed ports sink reeling at my far-
aimed thunder stroke ;
And an immemorial empire flings its last flag to
the breeze,
Sinking with its splintered navies down in the
unpitying seas.
But the blind of sight awaken to an unimagined
day,
And the mean of soul grow conscious there is
greatness in their clay ;
Where my bugle voice goes pealing slaves grow
heroes at its breath
And the trembling coward rushes to the welcome
arms of death.
Pagan, heathen and inhuman, devilish as the
heart to hell.
Wild as chaos, strong for ruin, clothed in hate
unspeakable—
So they call me—and I care not—still I work my
waste afar,
Heeding not your weeping mothers and your
widows—I am War !
But your softboned men grow heroes when my
flaming eyes they see,
And I teach your little peoples how supremely
great they be ;
Yes, I tell them of the wideness of the soul's un-
folded plan
And the god-like stuff that's moulded in the mak-
ing of a man.
Ah, the god-like stuff that’s moulded in the mak-
ing of aman !
It has stood my iron testing since this strong old
world began,
Tell me not that men are weaklings, halting trem-
blers, pale and slow—
There is stuff to shame the seraphs in the race of
men—I know.
I have tested them by fire, and I know that man
is great,
And the soul of man is stronger than is either
death or fate ;
And where’er my bugle calls them, under any sun
or star,
They will leap with smiling faces, tothe fire test
of war.
—~Sam Walter Foss in the New York Sun,
EZEKIEL’'S COURTSHIP.
It was very warm—even up there, where
just a slight breeze rustled the leaves on
the apple trees ; and Martha Ann Chishy
set down her pan of peapods with some
show of impatience. She wiped her thin,
flushed face with the corner of her blue
gingham apron ; then fanned herself with
the edge of it. :
‘I do declare, ef this ain’t the very hot-
test Jay I ever see, even here on Hill-top,
and them bees do make an awful tiresome
noise, ’’ she said, half-aloud, looking across
the heat-haze in the pretty garden to some
bee hives on a bench under the trees. *‘I
can’t seem to settle to anythin’ sensible to-
day ; I can’t think what's taken me,’’ she
continued, presently rising from the steps
and lifting two tin pans, one in each hand.
She rattled the shelled peas about medi-
tatively, fora few minutes, then turned
and walked into the house. It was an old-
fashioned dwelling, built in a style of long
ago, with a wide hall running through the
middle of it. Martha Ann lived there all
alone, with only the memories of her 40
years for company. :
There had been a day when she might
have said ‘‘good-by’’ to the old home, and
gone away with ‘‘somebody’’—but duty to
a helpless old father had ehanged her des-
tiny at a critical moment. Now, after
long years, the object of her faithful de-
votion lay sleeping in the church yard, and
Martha Ann Chisby found herself a lonely
woman, well on in years, with only a few
traces of her flower-like beauty of 20 win-
ters ago. She managed to get along, and
ask no help of anyone. There had been
some little money left, and there was the
old place, dearer than ever to her woman’s
heart, now that she was bereft of all kith
and kin.
It was dark and cool in the wide hall,
save fora bright bar of sunlight lying across
the threshold of the open doorway. Martha
Ann, coming back from the warm kitchen
whither she had gone to set the peas boil-
ing for her midday meal, paused suddenly
before a shining oblong mirror, hanging
upon the wall. It had been a long while
since she had given her own features any
serious thought, but this morning she seem-
ed bent upon doing unusual things—me-
mories of the past flitted across her mind,
and she actually smiled at the faded face
reflected back to her from the glass. Start-
ing guiltily, as though fearful lest some one
should catch her in an act of apparent
vanity, Martha Ann made an uncertain
step or two away. Then, realizing the
isolation of her position, she came back
with firm tread to her fascinating self-re-
flections. A look of determination grew
upon her thin but still pretty lips, albeit
her hands trembled a little, as she raised
them to her head and hastily pul’ed out the
pins that detained her hair in its hard un-
gainly knot. She silently piled it loosely
upon the top of her head in a becoming
knot. She still boasted a goodly
share of golden brown about her temples,
and with a shamed look, stepped back to
study the effect.
A swift color flew to her pale cheeks, and
it must be confessed that the woman, in
that shadowy light, looked startlingly like
the girl of many years ago—the girl, who,
to her own cost, had placed Duty before
Love—a love that her heart had plead for
with all its might.
With the girlish blush came a new sug-
gestion, and not caring to crush the tender
impulse, Martha Ann went swiftly up the
stairs, never pausing until she reached the
attic. There, kneeling trembling before
an old trunk, she gently pushed the shaky
lid back. A faint odor of lavender min-
gled with camphor rose up to greet her as
she bent over, and with eager fingers search-
ed among the folds of an ancient dimity
muslin, for a packet of yellow letters that
lay hidden there.
What depth of joy she found in the touch
of those old letters none but Martha Ann
herself can say. The slight physical con-
tact carried her back to the days when the
ardent writer of them breathed the same
words into her listening ears, and the hard
past was forgotten, as she went slowly,
lovingly through their contents. It filled
her heart with sadness, yet there was a
charm she could not resist. Indeed, they
miss much out their lives who have not
felt the pulse quicken, or eyes fill, as hands
fall lightly on some attic treasure of yel-
lowed papers, almost forgotten, but preg-
nani still with memories to hearts that
never grow old. Asthe last letter slipped
gently through her thin hands, Martha
Ann Chisby’s head went down upon the
aged trunk. Slow tears trickled over her
tired face, and a beam of mellow sunlight,
shifting across the dusty attic floor, rested
for a time upon her bowed head.
* * * * *®
Tf it was warm up on Hilltop that morn-
ing, it was broiling in the old New Eng-
land village in the hollow of the hill, and
Ezekiel Jones pulled up his steaming horse
under the shade of a giant elm by the road-
side to rest.
‘‘By Ginger! But ain’t it hot, Major ?’
he inquired of the poor beast, whose sides
labored from the exertion of drawing the
buggy up the long incline. Huge drops of
water rolled from him and made little
pools of black in the thick, white dust of
the road. Ezekiel regarded the suffering
creature anxiously for a time ; then throw-
ing the reins over the dash board, clamber-
ed down out of the buggy and proceeded
to loosen and lift off some of the harness.
‘It’s a cruel thing to drive a beast such
weather, no mistake. Ef we don’t have a
thunder storm soon that will blow the
spire clean off the church—then I'll be
blowed myself I” he continued, having re-
lieved the horse to his entire ‘satisfaction.
For Ezekiel Jones was a very tender-heart-
ed man, and could not bear to see a man
or beast unhappy.
After dusting a place carefully with a bit
of rag from the back of the buggy Ezekiel
sat cautiously down upon a log beneath
the tree. The dust lay thick on either
side, and he carefully laid the tails of his
best black coat, one on each knee ; then
fell to ruminating while wiping the inside
of his hat with a highly colored handker-
chief.
His gaze wandered idly across the white
road into the blossoming fields beyond,
where the flowers nodded lazily under the
fierce rays of the sun, and not a blade of
the long grass moved in the still, breath-
less air. Gradually a slow smile began to
dawn upon Ezekiel’s solemn face, and his
mild, blue eyes twinkled. He carried his
50 years well, though inclined to a stout-
ness that only emphasized the good nature
of his ruddy features.
No one to look at him would have ever
supposed Ezekiel Jones carried a secret
grief with him. Yet such was the case,
and in all the yearssince sorrow had touch-
ed him he had never turned his eyes to-
ward Hilltop, but a sudden mist had blur-
red their clear blue for a moment.
“I dunno how she’ll take it—but it’s
done, sure as gospel, and most everybody
must a’ seen it by now!” he suddenly
chuckled aloud. Then a swift gravity
spread over his face. ‘‘I shall risk it, fer
I’d be a lost man ef it came to her ears by
anybody, but—Lord, how’d I ever muster
up courage ter de it? I declare, I dunno
myself !”’ ‘he went on, and the horse, hav-
ing recovered his spirit, turned its head at
the sound of his kindly voice.
Ezekiel looked back at him for a minute,
then got slowly up, replaced the harness
and climbed back into the buggy. Gather-
ing up the reins, he sat a bit, gazing along
the animal’s fat sides. ‘‘No, I dunno how
I ever dared, but I'll never ask her agin if
she won't have me this time,’’ he muttered
then, with a very sober face. Slapping the
reins and clucking encouragingly, the good
man, in his shabby old turnout, presently
disappeared down the road, lost in a cloud
of dust.
Be it known that Ezekiel Jones had for
some years been elder of the little white
church, with its ancient green blinds, that
nestled among the great trees on one of the
village streets. Now, in those days, when
any couple proposed to risk the perils of
matrimony, instead of the banns being read
from the pulpit, paper slips bearing the
respective names of the high contracting
parties were pasted for three consecutive
Sundays above the ‘‘poor box’’ in the en-
trance of the edifice. It was elder Jones’
pleasant duty to paste up these white ‘‘shad-
ows” of ‘‘coming events,”’ and every one
who met the genial man was wont to in-
quire, ‘“Who ye ben pastin’ up now ?”’
*‘Who has been gitting stuck up to-day,
Zekiel ?’’ and so on. Some with smiling
interest ; others with simple curiosity.
Even the reticent spinster, Martha Ann
Chisby, had been known to ask this ques-
tion of him when they bad met unexpect-
edly upon the village street.
So on this sizzling July morning the
Elder Jones had, not without solemn, ser-
ious forethought, you may be sure, labor-
iously ‘‘pasted up’’ two new names—with
difficulty, too, as the gum showed a tend-
ency to run, in the stifling heat. It was
accomplished at last, however. and Ezekiel
Jones had stood back silently to contem-
plate his work. It was at that same mo-
ment that Martha Ann Chisby had stood
gazing at her reflection in the mirror, in her
darkened hallway.
A few stars still struggled to be seen
through the dense, black cloud drifts pil-
ing up in the heavens, and heat lightning
had been playing across the bank of threa-
tening darkness in the west for nearly an
hour, when Elder Jones could be seen by
the neighbors cautiously making his way
in his rakish old buggy up the rough,grass-
grown road to Hilltop. Martha Ann, sit-
ting again, but this time in complete idle-
‘ness, upon her doorstep, saw him, too, and
intense wonder grew in her heart. Only
when the tired horse came toa standstill,
and his master, after fastening the short-
rein to the gatepost, turned deliberately
and came up her garden path between the
rows of tall pink hollyhocks, did Martha
Ann overcome her amazement and rise
hastily to her feet.
The last star was hidden in blackness
and they could not see each other very
plainly now, though they stood awkwardly
within a few feet of one another. The man
was only conscious that there was the wo-
man his heart had hungered for through
long, bitter years ; while the woman burn-
ed with the guilty knowledge that for the
first time she stood robed in the very gown
she had worn when the two parted ! Drass-
ing herself in it had been the natural out-
come of that day of unnatural emotion,and
Martha Ann felt she was paying dearly for
her weakness. A sudden flare of lightning
made them hoth start, and broke the strain
of thesituation somewhat.
‘‘I ’spose, so long as I’ve come, I may as
well set down a bit,”’ suggested Ezekiel,
in a voice, gruff with repressed feeling.
‘“It—it locks a little mite threatenin,’
Elder Jones ; p’raps you’d best put your
horse up and stop ’til the shower’s over !”’
Martha Ann replied, with a forced cheer-
fulness. -
Ezekiel did as she bade him ; then they
sat on the porch, talking bravely upon the
weather until it appeared that thread-bare
subject would soon be exhausted.
Presently a roll of thunder boomed about
them, a gust of wind swept the porch and a
few big drops of rain fell at their feet.
Martha Ann rose quickly, gathering the
voluminous folds of the precious dimity
muslin, with its faded rosebuds, close about
her, and went into the house followed, by
Ezekiel his heart thumping like a trip-
hammer. For he knew his second hour
had come, yet dreaded to ‘‘put it to the
touch, to win or lose it all.”
The excitement had brought a faint flush
to Martha Ann’s cheeks, and a soft light
to her eyes that rolled the stone of ten
years back from her age, and made her, in
her faithful lover’s sight, as beautiful to-
night in her quaint muslin as in the days
that were dead. Martha had lighted the
center lamp with such unsteady hands that
Ezekiel had found it necessary to aid her.
Their fingers had met and the contact had
seemingly struck them dumb again, for
they now sat in utter silence---Martha
Ann’s eyes on the gaudy, flowered carpet,
Ezekiel’s upon her.
Suddenly a brilliant thought struck the
unhappy woman ; she felt the need of
breaking the silence at any cost, and in his
position of elder it was quite the proper
question to put to him. ¢
‘“Who’ve you been pastin’ up now, El-
der Jones ?”’ she asked, timidly, clasping
her thin fingers nervously.
A guilty wave of red flooded Ezekiel’s
round face, then receded, leaving him very
white. He cleared his throat twice before
essaying to speak.
‘‘Wall---Marthy Ann---I dunno as I
oughter done it, but— I—I pasted you and
me up !”’ he said at last, in a deep voice.
He clutched the sharp sides of his chair
hard with his powerful hands, and fast-
ened his blue eyes upon her face, much as
a drowning man would upon a receding
boat.
Martha Ann had risen and now stood
looking down at him with frightened, in-
dignant eyes.
*‘Ezekiel Jones—what do you mean ?”’
she gasped, standing very straight.
Ezekiel’s eyes plead with all their might
and main. ‘Jes’ what I said —Marthy—I
kinder thought it would be a good idee ;
I—I’ve waited a long while, Marthy !’’ he
replied, desperately.
Once more they faced each other. A
feeling of keen resentment came over Mar-
tha Ann for the daring part he had played,
and yet, woman-like, she admired him in-
tensely for it. What it was that made her
say what she did the next moment, she
could never afterward explain ; the heart
of woman is skrouded in mystery, even to
herself oftentimes.
‘Well, you kin jus’ go an’ take them
down agin,”’ shesaid then, in a low, angry
tone.
‘‘Do you mean that, Marthy ?"’ Ezekiel
asked slowly, unutterable pain breaking
through his voice.
There was silence for a space, only the
rain beat in great gusts against the window
panes, and the wind sobbed around the
corners of the house, mingled with the mut-
tering of thunder.
‘Then I’ll jes’ go an’ take ’em down—
as you won’t have me, no way, my little
Marthy. I'll go take ’em down again,”
said Ezekiel at last, huskily, turning sadly
away, the big tears standing in his honest
eyes.
He reached the door, his hand was upon
the knob, when there came a sudden, ap-
palling burst of thunder and the whole
room shone with vivid light.
‘‘Ezekiel I’ cried a scared, faint voice.
He turned and was by her side in three
strides. Martha Ann put two trembling,
work-hardened hands up to his face, and
drew it tenderly down to hers.
‘‘Ezekiel ! I’ve been thinkin’ that, as
long as you’ve got ’'m up—and—and taken
all the trouble, why—well, you might as
well leave ’em there,”’ she said, softly.
—A. P. Tedd, in Pittsburg Dispatch.
Ten Thousand Rabbits.
They Were Siain in a Shot Gun Drive on the Pacific
Coast.
The first rabbit drive of the season in
Fresno county, Cal., took place recently,
said the San Francisco Chronicle. As com-
pared with the great drive of March 12th,
1892, and the still bigger drive of May 5th,
1894, the attendance was small, but both
these affairs had been well advertised in the
valley counties, and the numbers of those
who took part in the drive bore some pro-
portions to the rabbits slaughtered.
This one was strictly a county drive,
and, while the expanded line was scarcely
five miles long at 9 a. m., the number of
rabbits in front of the contracted line at 1
p. m. ranged high up in the thousands.
The corral was located at the intersection
of roads leading west and south, ahout four
miles west of the village of Orleander,
nearly southwest of Fresno and on the
Smith ranch.
It was what is known as a shot gun rab-
bit drive, the slaughter of the pests com-
mencing as soon as the contracting lines
came in sight of the corral. The rabbits
were unusually numerous, and not one in
ten broke through the lines. In this respect
the drive contrasted sharply with the big
drives of 1892 and 1894, where almost as
many rabbits escaped as were slaughtered.
Shot guns were used with effect, and the
result was that when the corral was reach-
ed only a small number of the great round
up remained for slaughter.
Estimates of the number killed differ
widely, because of the continuous destruc-
tion of the pests by gun fire on the way to
the corral, but it is probable that the rab-
bit population around Washington colony
has been reduced by not less than ten thou-
sand.
The Land of the Lazy.
“‘In a late sojourn in Honduras’’ said L.
B. Givens, ‘I came to the conclusion that
it was a paradise for lazy men. Every-
thing grows luxuriantly with but little
labor on the part of the natives, and many
crops donot need replanting more than
once in 8 or ten years. The country offers
fine inducements to enterprising men, but
it is hard on a white man used to civilized
ways to go down there and dwell among
an ignorant lot of natives. A man would
have no congenial society, and might as
well be in exile. The natives usually live
in bamboo houses, though in the towns the
dwellings are of adobe. Children go naked
for the first two or three years of their life,
and the attire of the adults is rather scant.
The government is liberal with concessions
in order to encourage development of the
country’s resources, but there is no gen-
eral rule govering the granting of privi-
leges ; it all depends on how good a bar-
gain may be driven. The climate is very
salubrious, and laziness is about the only
prevailing disease.”’
——DMiss Kate Lutz, a seventeen year-
old girl, of Fredericksburg, Lebanon coun-
ty, locked her lover in a room down stairs,
Sunday evening, and going to a room alone
attempted self destruction by hanging. The
young man grew suspicious and forced the
door, as'well as the door to the room in
which he found her hanging. She will
recover. No reason is assigned.
Three Daughters of Austria.
Those who read the somewhat pathetic
speech of the queen regent of Spain, de-
livered to the Spanish Cortes, could not
help but feel a little sympathy with her as
a woman in a puzzling and troublesome
situation. Her plea as a mother for the
welfare of her son’s throne, which he is not
yet old enough to occupy, was rather
touching, and struck a cord to which even
the enemies of Spain must respond. We
can sympathize with her in her motherly
anxiety for the reason that it does not
clash with our present purposes. We are
only concerned now with the government
of the island of Cuba, and have no interest
as to what scion of royalty shall sit upon
the throne of Spain in the future. By her
marriage this woman Maria Christina of
Austria has annexed to her life a great deal
of trouble, the end of which no one can
see. At the head of a bankrupt kingdom,
with rebellious subjects in her colonies, and
threatened rebellion at home ; with a peo-
ple overburdened with taxes, not knowing
which way to look to obtain the means to
replenish the treasury or to keep afloat the
great debt of the nation ; and at the same
with a war on hands against overwhelm-
ing odds, her lot is indeed not a very hap-
py one.
She was horn to the purple, being the
granddaughter of a former emperor of Aus-
tria and a niece to the present one; but
that avails her little in these days. It 1s
not likely that one of the sovereigns of Eu-
rope will dare to come to her aid against
the exasperated democracy of the new
world, which is asserting itself so positively
and is presuming to dictate the course of
behavior of one of the oldest monarchies
toward certain of its subjects on this side
of the water.
3%
There was a time when such conduct on
our part would have been resented by
every crowned head as an assult on kingly
rule and the divine right of certain families
to reign, but democracy is too powerful
now to be treated in that way ; and much
as the reigning families of Europe may dis-
like our assumptions on this continent, a
certain long-headed prudence, which they
have acquired, prevents them from inter-
fering, and the queen and her people must
face the crisis alone. In the midst of it all
she has no doubt had many regrets that she
did not remain 1 the peaceful convent at
Prague, from which she came in 1879 to
become the second wife of the young king
Alfonso, who dying, left the cares of the
kingdom to her in 1885.
But she is not the only daughter of the
royal house of Austria who has found un-
happiness and sore trouble through mar-
riage to the ruling prince of another
nation. She is the third within a century
who have had unhappy and cruel exper-
iences. Marie Antonette, the unfortunate
queen of Louis XVI, of France, was also a
princess of Austria, being a daughter of the
emperor Francis I. As long as the history
of the human race shall be preserved, her
tragic and terrible fate will never be for-
gotten. One of the gayest and most viva-
cious of women as well as one of the most
beautiful, she was first crucified by the
tongue of slander, then became a prisoner
in her own palace, was cast into prison
like a common criminal, saw her husband
taken away to be beheaded, and later, on a
felon’s cart, she was transported through
the streets of Paris, subject to the jeers of
the mob, which did not cease until the ter-
rible knife of the guillotine fell upon her
fair neck. Though all Europe shuddered,
no power could save her from hie vengeance
of the terrible apostles of liberty.
*
In spite of this it was only 17 years
thereafter when, in 1810, another daughter
of the Austrian royal house became the
sharer of the French throne as the consort
of the great and terrible Napoleon. All her
life she had been taught to execrate the
Corsican upstart, who had spread terror
through Europe, and who had so frequently
inflicted defeat upon the armies of her fath-
er, Francis I. ; but in the course of time,
and a very short time at that, the ‘‘up-
start’’ became an emperor himself, and a
powerful one. In looking round for an al-
liance with a royal house he selected the
charming princess who was one of the
chief adornments of the court at Vienna.
Reasons of state led to the matter being ar-
ranged, so she was married to Napoleon on
April 1st, 1810.
She came to his court and for a time
shared the most powerful court in Christen-
dom, but her royal birth and blood did
not incline her to admire or to affiliate
readily with the rather new and crude peo-
ple who composed the court of the former
‘‘upstart.”” Her life was not a happy one.
In less than five years Waterloo came, and
Napoleon was sent to St. Helena. The
haughty Austrian princess who had mar-
ried him for reasons of state took no more
interest in his fate, retired to Austria, be-
came the more ganatic wife of an obsure
prince, and ended in a most commonplace
manner a life that at the time of her mar-
riage promised exceptional brilliancy. It
is not impossible that as the present queen
regent of Spain contemplates the difficulties
that surround her, she recurs to the fate of
her female relatives of former generations
who have contracted marriages among the
princes of that region known to the Romans
as Gaul.
The National Guard.
Strength and Equipment of the Soldiers of Our First
Reserve.
There are 10,000,000 men liable to mili-
tary service in the United States.
The actual strength of all the state
soldiers composing the national guard pre-
vious to the recent call by the President
for troops was 113,460 men and officers.
A special feature of the national guard
of New York is the efficiency it has attain-
ed in the military signal and telegraph ser-
vice. The signal corps attached to a bri-
gade is furnished with all the improved
United States army signal kits, field tele-
graph instruments, field telephones, flash
lanterns and heliographs, engineering and
electrical instruments.
The work of a signal corps in state camp
includes besides signaling the study of
engineering, including making road maps,
field sketching and bridge and signal tower
building.
The normal strength of the national
guard in New York state is 13,285. The
number of males in the state liable to mili-
tary service is 942,750.
Next to New York, Pennsylvania is
strongest in its national guard, with 8,547
men. Wyoming, with a voll of 345, has
the smallest enlistment, while Nevada,
with 346 men, goes it one better. Alaska
and the Indian Territory have no organized
militia.
——Colorado Springs boasts of being the
quietest town in the country. No church
bells are rung there and no whistles are
blown. A local paper admits that the dogs
bark at night in Colorado Springs, as they
do everywhere else, but it adds that ‘‘when
they run about they make no noise with
their feet in the sandy soil.”
National Value of Forests.
The Experience of Spain a Warning for the Legis-
lators of this Country.
Inasmuch as a proposition is pending in
Congress to reopen to settlement certain
forest reservations in the West, a very per-
tinent comment is that made by Mr. Chas.
Francis Adams on one of the causes that
have led to the downfall of Spain. Itis a
fact that this peninsula once supported a
population of 40,000,000 to 50,000,000 and
now holds a meagre 17,000,000. The main
reason for that is stated by Mr. Adams as
follows :
“During the last three years I have
passed much time in Europe, visiting
among other countries, Spain Italy, Ger-
many, France and England. Whoever
wishes to study the effect of deforesting on
a country and on its people should by all
means visit Spain. Not only has the
country been ruined, but the very charac-
ter of the people has been changed by the
wholesale destruction of trees and the ne-
glect in their renewal. The rivers have
become mountain torrents, and large
portions of the country a rugged, upland
desert. The same process is to-day going
on in Italy. The result on that country,
as noticed by me in visits ten years apart,
is lamentable The ancient forests are be-
ing wholly stripped from the mountains,
and, while the rivers are converted into
torrents, the water is not held in the soil.
In Germany, on the other hand, the fores-
try laws are admirable. The result upon
the country, climate and rainfall is appar-
ent to the most careless observer.”
It is certainly timely to urge the nation
that it shall not permit itself to copy the
Spanish example of decay in this or in any
other respect. The fact stated by Mr.
Adams has heen corroborated again and
again, to the effect that the denudation of
the mountain slopes of Spain and the ero-
sion of all soil have reduced it to a condi-
tion of semi-aridity and lessened its power
to support population until one-third of its
population is to-day indulging in bread
riots.
Of all the civilized nations we most
nearly copy the Spanish stupidity in the
waste of our forests. We should certainly
set about showing ourselves to be wiser
than the nation whose decay is now so evi-
dent. The forests of the Pacific slope
should be intelligently preserved ; the
waste lands of the Mississippi Valley and
Atlantic coast should be reforested.
There can be no better investment in a
double sense that to replant those portions
of the country that are practically useless
for farming with these trees that in a gen-
eration or two would by -their value as
timber repay the cost with interest.
Plant Sugar Maples.
Should we plant maple groves? There
can hardly be two opinions @ this subject.
The beet-sugar industry is @problem, says
Mr. Powell, in the New York Tribune, but
the maple-sugar industry never was a pro-
blem. It pays better than three-fourths of
our farm work. At eight cents a pound
maple sugar finds ready market, while much
of the better product sells at ten cents and
twelve cents. The syrup is sold by pro-
ducers directly to consumers at $1 a gallon
—very rarely less than eighty cents.
Throughout New York, New Jersey, Penn-
sylvania and other States this direct sale to
consumers takes up a large part of the pro-
duct excepting only two or three countries
of Northern New York. Butit is not, just
now, as a market product that the subject
should be mainly considered. Every fami-
ly isa sugar consumer and a sugar buyer.
Most farmers can make the larger part
of this sugar supply as easily as they
can raise their own potatoes. A fami-
ly of six or seven will consume from one to
two barrels of sugar. Granulated sugar
will cost such a family from $15 to $30 a
year. A grove of fifty trees will produce
from 20 to 250 pounds of maple sugar.
That is, where the trees stand in the open.
The product is less where the sugar is made
from trees in the forest. This is equiva-
lent to at least half the family’s require-
ments for sugar. But the sales of syrup
will make an aggregate value per tree even
higher. A grove of fifty trees in the open
will occupy not more than a quarter of an
acre. Besides the sugar product the grove
is advantageous for shade, also for an enor-
mous product of humus each fall, and for
windbreaks and shelter, and as an equalizer
of temperature and moisture. Maple trees
should grow in a grove. They do not
thrive as well as street trees, where they
are subject to much abuse of the saw and
exposure of the trunk to hot snnshine. A
grove might well be given place on every
farm of twenty acres. Why shall there not
be a general planting of maple groves dur-
ing the spring of 1898 ?
Once Considered Insane.
Some interesting stories about the enlist-
ment of recruits to the Ninth have been
going the rounds. One of the assistant
surgeons of the Ninth gave a young man a
rigid examination, under orders, as the
young man was not thought to be a desira-
ble recruit.
After the applicant’s weight and height
had been ascertained, and the color of his
hair and eyes noted, the dialogue between
surgeon and prospective recruit went on as
follows :
‘Were you ever rejected for life insur-
ance ?”’
“No.”
‘‘Have you ever given up an occupa-
tion on account of your health or
habits ?”’ ’
“No.”
‘Are you subject to dizziness?’
¢‘No.”
‘‘To fluttering heart, pain in the chest,
cold in the head, shortness of breath, severe
headache ?’’
¢‘No.”’
‘‘Have you had fits”
“No.”
‘Nor stiff joints !"’
“No.”
«‘Sunstroke ?’’
¢‘No.”’
‘‘Have you ever heen
sane ?’
“Yes, sir.”’
‘‘What’s that you say ?’’ asked the sur-
geon, scratching out the ‘‘No’’ that he
had written in anticipation of a negative
answer.
“Well, I guess it’s all right,’”’ replied
the recruit. ‘‘My mother said that I was
insane to-night when I told her that I was
going to enlist. As I got tired of saying
‘No’ I just thought I'd mention it.”
considered in-
A Job Pat Liked.
A Philadelphia man is responsible for
the following tale : ‘‘I met the other day
an old Irishman, who used to bea paper-
mill roustabout when I knew him, and, as
he was in his working clothes, I said :
‘Well, Mike, have youa job !” ‘Oi hov,’
he replied, ‘an’ be th’ same token I hov a
dom foine wan, too.” ‘What are you do-
ing ?’ I asked again. ‘Oi hov a job tear-
ing down a Protestant church, and, be-
gorra, Oim getting paid fur it.”’
FOR AND ABOUT WOMEN.
Miss Augusta R. Briard served in the
carding room of the Pacific Mill, at Law-
rence, Mass., continuously for forty-five
years. For thirty years she was under one
overseer. She lived in one corporation
building house for thirty-five years, during
thirty-two of which she occupied one room.
She has earned enough to maintain her
comfortably, and will spend the rest of her
days at Salem with relatives.
Nothing is more useful for the little maid
for summer than a flannel or serge sailor
suit and middy cap. Serge is an excellent
material, for it does not show the dust.
The skirts are cut like mamma’s, with a
slight flare at the hem. The blouse hangs °
over the waistband and it is finished with
a sailor collar, over which is worn a white
linen collar trimmed with braid. Blue,
white and red are the favorite colors for
the sailor suits. A suit of dark cranberry
red has a collar braided with black and the
jacket is tied with black ribbon. It is
worn over & white duck guimpe.
Six girls at a smart luncheon all in black
taffeta skirts and white pique shirt waists.
This was unique enough in itself to set the
fashion, as it included four of the smartest
debutantes and two of the best known girls
who had been out for three years. And set
the fashion it did, for every woman who
has the price in her purse, and that need
not be very much, has made up her mind
that the black taffeta skirt and the white
pique shirt waist she must have.
If you have an inexpensive dressmaker
work for you by the day you can get the
taffeta skirt cheaper than you can buy it
ready made. Put the ruffles nearly to the
waist ; and they are inexpensive and more
satisfactory, made of taffeta than those ruf-
fles that are bound in velvet ribbons. They
look so very hot on a sweltering day and
the ruffles catch the dust in a manner
which is unpleasant to deal with. Your
skirt must be narrow, the ruffles must be
bias, not too full, rising upward a little ab
the back and fitting very closely over the
hips.
The pique shirt waist is made on the
original shirt waist plan; yoke in the
back, not too full in front, because the
pique is too stiff to allow many gathers;
sleeves narrow, ending in short, small cuffs.
Your sleeves, by the way, must have the
effect that the men’s peg top trousers do;
they all grow much narrower at the wrist,
with a cuff fitting snugly. Very large,
round white crochet buttons are used down
the front and rarely does a linen collar go
with the shirt waist.
There is another story in that. For lin-
en collars are getting out of favor; the
good form neck arrangement of to-day to
be worn with the shirt waist is plaid taffe-
ta ribbon, crossed around at the back of the
neck, brought down very low in front and
tied in a small flat bow, with two rounded
ends reaching nearly to the waist.
The collar is finished with a narrow turn-
over bit of muslin. You buy them at 35
cents a pair if plain, 45 cents a pair if em-
broidered. You can make them yourself
for much less. They are only side pieces ;
do not meet in front or back, but with
your smartest gown remember to wear
your muslin turn-over piece. The varia-
tions for your white pique shirt waist are
many.
If it is for a morning call or a shopping
expedition, a piece of black taffeta ribbon
with a white turnover collar, the taffeta
edged with narrow black lace, tied in a flat
bow right over the first button hole. This
with a black hat makes the most effective
morning costume to be worn for the sum-
mer. For a luncheon or afternoon drive,
even an informal dinner, the stock is of
lavender or pink satin, edged with white
lace, the long, round ends of the streamers
baving applied designs of rich lace on
them. A girdle of satin to match with a
heavy enameled or jewel buckle, as bril-
liant a hat as you care to wear, and you are
dressed for the afternoon.
This season’s beruffled skirts are vastly
becoming to tall, slender figures. A con-
scientious dressmaker, however, will by no
means recommend such a style to the short,
plump woman. For her should be chosen
a plain, untrimmed skirt, with many nar-
row gores, as it makes the wearer appear
taller and slimmer.
Neckwear for women is what bothers
them now, The best and latest is summed
up as follows :
In addition to the gingham ties fair
throats will be ornamented this season with
handsome satin puff scarfs, the ends left to
hang spreading and free, or folded neatly
and flatly into the lady baby pattern. This
last lets fall its satin ends from neck to
waist line, is made up on a frame and sold
complete and ready for adjustment, with a
pretty pearl pin settled in its folds. Sum-
ming up the full compliment of summer
neckwear mention must be made of the
brocaded silk Teck and Ascot ties and of
the big, showy Princess of Wales. This
last is built of gay bengaline or soft paille
puffed up on a frame, with or without a
high throat stock. It is sold in white and
the palest tints, else in vividly Roman
striped taffeta. Neckties, in common with
gowns, hats, sashes and gloves, sunshades
and under petticoates, are reflecting the all-
prevading tint of theseason, which is blue.
The spring skies are repeated everywhere
on the streets and in the shop windows,
and not to wear blue of some tone is to be
one season behind the times. Azure and
flag blue are the two favorite knots of this
color.
Ruffles on waists as on skirts, are narrow
and cut bias, and are chiefly worn around
the lower part of the yoke and over the top
of the sleeve. A design for a slender figure
shows two-inch ruffles all around the waist
from the neck to the belt, and on the
sleeves from the elbow to the shoulder.
The red-white-and-blue craze is in evi-
dence everywhere. When conservative
business men wear as many as three or
four quite good-sized flags on their coats
and are proud of them, small wonder that
women have fallen in love with the Dewey
shirt waist. These Dewey waists are of
blue and white stripes running bias in the
front with the straight pleat as is fashionable
now. They are in Madras, lawn or Japa-
nese silk, with collar and cuffs of red. Be-
sides being novel and appropriate, their ef-
fect is very pretty and becoming.
Handsome facsimiles of the belts worn
by officers of the navy and army are being
built for the shirt waist girl. The buckles
are of silver, handsomely gilded, and ex-
act reproductions of the regulation brass
ones, while the belt is of the finest gold
webing. The girls will soon be carrying
canteens full of yellow fever antidote.
Some of the thin wash dresses for girls
are tucked from hem to waist, and others
have tucks alternating with narrow lace-
edged frills all the way up the skirt.