Bellefonte, Pa., Sept. 15, 1905.
ESCs
“GOING TO THE FAIR.
ES
Hitch the ox team Johnny—ain’t no time to
spare;
Jenny, put yer bonnet on—we're goin’ to the
Fair!
Hurry up yer mammy—comb the young un’s
hair;
Johnny, hitch the ox team; we’re goin’ to the
Fair!
Trot the brindle heifer out—get the pigs in
line;
Put in forty gallons of that old Blackberry
Wine;
An’ then, the quilt yer mammy made when
Billy wuz a boy;
An’ my cure fer rheumatism—*‘Everlastin’
Oil o’ Joy!” ;
An’ then, that Autermatic Hoe that took the
county prize;
An’ don’t forgit a cord o’ wood—fer coal is on
the rise;
An’ then, that big prize pumpkin’that wuz
sunnin’ on the shed,
Arn’, fallin’ on the parson, knocked the ser-
mons out his head!
Hurry up the women-folks—time’s a flyin’
fast;
We want so take the first prize—whoever
takes the last;
The bands air playin’ “Dixie ”—ain’t a min-
ute now to spare;
Johnny, hitch the ox team—we’re goin’ to
the Fair!
Frank L. STANTON.
YOUNG BOB KEMP.
As you did not know the Whist Set of
Palmerton, I an sure you will die without
knowing the best and the dearest people
the world hasseen. The Whist Set met
every Thursday evening, usually at ‘‘Mrs,
De’s”’(for so we called the gentle aquiline-
nosed lady,one of the De Mortimers of New
Rochelle), and was the cream of the cream
of the little Iowa town.
To play whist was in itself a token of ar-
istocracy, or was in those days—now it is
played by very common people, I hear,—
and to play whist with the Whist Set was to
be above the straggle for social position. If
was to be cultured and refined and gentle
to know how to pronounce ‘‘caliope’’ and
‘‘isothermal’’ so correctly that no one ouns-
side the set could understand them. Dear
gentle ladies! Only ‘*Mrs. De’”’ remains
now; and the gentlemen? — they are all
gone, every one, even Young Bob Kemp!
It is a different Palmerston now than when
Iwas a girl. My Palmerton was a hilltop
on which the Whist Ses lived in gentle con-
sciousness of the ‘‘down-town’’ and of the
‘‘meadows’’ where business and labor was
supposed to be. Now Palmerton is saw-
mills and shops, and the main street, and
public libraries, and improvements, and
noise,and prosperity. It is a great Gecadence.
I must have been a very silent and obe-
dient little girl in those days, for I was al-
lowed to go to the whists with my aant. I
suppose I went to sleep in a chair very soon
after the playing began, for I recollect al-
ways finding myself on ‘Mrs. De’s’”’ big
bed when going-home time came, but while
I remained awake I was blissfully happy.
I used to look forward to the whist even-
ing all the week. ‘Mrs. De’s’’ house al-
ways smelled so good. It was the odor of
sandalwood, I know now. And always
she met me with the same, ‘‘And Elsie too!
Well! well!” which was like a clean aris-
tocratic benediction. Then there were wa-
fers for me at once; thin cakes that melted
on your tongue and tasted very much like
the wafers we fed the goldfish on at home,
but with a tantalizing flavor that was al-
most tasteable, but not quite. And pre-
served ginger! Just a little piece, bus there
was no other in all Palmerton, and it was
like a bit of edible fairy-land.
‘*Mrs. De’s’”’ house was a wonderland to
me then. Its china was so thin, its linen
so fine and white, and everything so un-
usual and delicate and gentle. Things can
have gentleness, I am sare, and in ‘Mrs.
De’s’’ house one wished to be polite to the
very china and teapots. And ‘‘Mrs. De”
herself was more gentle and delicate than
anything in ber house. ° Tall and giay and
thin and very, very proud, in a sweet way
that hurt no one’s feelings, but was con-
stantly hurting her own.
The other ladies were. quite as gentle
and sweet; Miss Sophy and Mrs. E., my
aunt Lon, Mary Wentworth, the Warren
sisters, and all the rest. Then there were
the men. Mr. De, big and bluff and serious
and kind; Mr. Howard, graybaired and a
bank president,and occasionally the rector.
They all considered whist a most serious
occapation. Even my aunt, who couldn’t
remember tramps or what had been played
and who led the wrong card regularly, felt,
I am sure, that next to religion came whiss.
You can imagine,then,how odd and quaint
Bob Kemp must have seemed among these
gentle, serious whisters. For there was not.
a serious thing apparent about Bob Kemp
Bob Kemp at the whist night was like—let
me see!—like a harlequin in eburch,
This was Bob Kemp: A tall man, iron-
gray bair parted at one side and brushed
smoothly over the bald place and fluffed
up just over the ears, thin white face and
narrow, square forehead, dozens of little
smile wrinkles at the sides of his eyes; a
good chin; a white mustache, with long
drooping ends; wee feet and hands, and the
brightest, most twinkling, gray eyes man
ever had.
Usually Bob Kemp said, ‘‘Miss Lon’!
(that was my aunt), ‘‘we will let these old
fogies cat for partners, but yon and I will
play together tonight. We must redeem our
errors of last week,”’ and my aunt would
agree, because she, dear lady, knew she
played miserably, and’ she did not like to
be an annoyance to any of the better play-
ers. It did not matter to Rob Kemp. And
the others agreed to this, because it was
hoped that some time Bob Kemp wounld—
well, that Aunt Lon would become Mrs.
Bob Kemp! There seemed no one young
enough and good enough for Aunt Lou but
Bob Kemp,and every one thought it would
ve best for Aunt Lou and hest for Bob
Kemp,and Bob Kemp really meant to mar-
ry Auns Lon sometime, but he thought
there was no hurry. He was youog yet aud
0 was Aunt Lou, and be did not believe
in 4 mau marrying too young! Bob Kemp
was only fifty-vine,and my Aunt Lou only
fitsy. He had felt toojyoung to marry for
forty years, and he swore he felt younger
every day. Sharh :
Of coarse there was no engagement, ‘nor
even anything understood hetween ‘Aunt
Lou and Bob Kemp. but it was understood
by all the other ‘‘whisters.”’ - Bob Kemp
always walked home with Aunt Louand
me, avd 1 hase been, told that: he began
walking bowme with ber rome twenty years
before I was born. Bob Kem is in
his youth. He felt yonng, and he boasted
that be felt young, aud by filling his life
with boyish pranks hie kept himsell young.
He was always up to some "kind of trick. 1
remember how shocked I was when he took
dinner with us once and Aunt Lou foolish-
ly asked him to say grace, and he rattled
off the alphabet under his breath! Aunt
Lou did not hear him, but I did, and like
a little minx, I told her. He took the up-
braiding that Aunt Lon gave as pars of
the good joke, and assured her that he had
given the Lord all the graces that could be
possibly said. It was only a matter of ar-
ranging the letters of the alphabet proper-
ly. Some of the things he did were so
shocking that the dear old ladies of the
Whist Set wonld have been mortally of-
fended, but thas it was Bob Kemp did them.
They forgave him because he was Bob
Kemp,and especially because he was Young
Bob Kemp. I think they liked his youth-
fulness. They must have felt, at times,
that they were quite old, and have joyed
in the companionship of a young man.They
really believed he was young. They had
believed it 80 many years that it had be-
come an accepted fact,like'*When in doubt
play trumps.’’
He was always a gentleman, and besides
he was their only link with the newer and
younger Palmerston.
Bob Kemp danced.Every night he seem-
ed to have a dance, or a party, or a straw-
ride, or some pleasuring on hand, and he
was as popular with the girls of the young-
er set as he was with the old ladies of the
Whist Set. There were few of the younger
men and boys who had a chance with the
girls if Bob Kemp’s invitation arrived at
the same time. He was so witty, so well
dressed, so gentlemanly, and such a splen-
did dancer that to have him for an escort
or a partner was a great happiness. I im-
agine that my aunt rather liked this popu- |
larity of Bob Kemp; I know she thought
of him as a boy rather than a man.
It seems a trite thing to say, but it was
the youthfulness of Bob Kemp that kept
him young, just as the knowledge of her
beauty keeps a woman beantiful. Bob
Kemp lived his youth and joyed in it. I
can hardly say that he cultivated is, for
that is too cruel, but he met it more than
half-way, and he needed the spur it gave
to him.
In his truly young days Bob Kemp had
gone the pace, which, in a raw town like
Palmerton, is a brutal pace indeed. I never
learned just what it was he did, but there
was a horrid scandal, and he was never to
be trusted by cold-blooded business men
again. It must have been very brave of
him to stay in Palmerton. The gossips are
like gadflies there. Bus he stayed,and after
the debauch that led to the wickedness,
whatever it was, he was never seen intoxi-
cated again, but he never forgot, and his
gayety and youth were but anodynes that
eased the pain of a great wound. He hid
from himself in the new self he created, but
the old self was just outside, ready to step
in and render his life miserable. I know
we young girls used to think, when we
were old enough to think, that Bob Kemp
was a great buffoon and laughing-stock, bus
when 1 became older and knew his story I,
for one,saw in him a hero such as the world
has but few of —a weak man with strength
enough to call to his aid a second self to
combat his weakness.
There was something magnificent in the
way he fooled not only our little world, but
himself also, into believing in his youth, in
spite of the bald spot and the smile wrink-
les and the gray hair.
Whether his misdemeanor had been so
great that no one dared give him a position
of trust, or whether the first year of distrust
killed his ambition,or whether his gayeties
absorbed all the ambition he had I do not
know, but he never had a position above
that of a common clerkship in a book-store,
and the wage must have been very small.
He took a room at this or that hoarding-
house as old ones discontinued or new ones
began, but it was always the smallest room
and the cheapest. He spent most of his
wage for clothes—for a young man must
dress well—or for the expenses his social
gaveties demanded.
He was in many respects the life of the
town; always foremost in organizing pleas-
ures, as subscription dances, moonlight ex-
ours: iver, , and scarce |
a day passed that the Palmerton Eagle did
not record some doing of his, either in so-
ciety or in the way of some harmless prac-
tical jokes.
The Whist Set very seldom got into the
Eagle. 1 think Van Dorn, the editor, left
their names out purposely, for he had a
good senee of the fitness of things, and the
Whist Set was too genteel and retiring to
be dragged relentlessly into the glare of
print; Van Dorn fele that it would mar one
of the finest things in Palmerton,—he had
an artistic goul in his hard- worked body.
Just because the Whist Set was so seldom
in print it enjoyed the more the frequent
allusions to Bob Kemp. The refined ladies
were so far from the bustle of society that
the little ‘‘Locals’’ were looked for eagerly.
The printed doings of Bob Kemp was their
share in the Eagle.
I know Bob Kemp enjoyed its items. In
fact he usually posted Van Dorn, stopping
in at the littered editorial-room on his way
home to smoke a cigar and give full partic-
ulars, for the Eagle bad no society editor.
I know, too, that Bob Kemp had a scrap-
book in which he pasted the items. He
laughingly said he intended writing a his-
tory of Palmerton’s social gayeties some-
time, and that the clippings were his docn-
ments, but it would bave been an incom-
plete history, if he had ever written if, for
the affairs in which he took no part were
not recorded in the serap-book.
One of the things that few people have
the bardihood to admit is that they like to
see their names in the newspapers, and in
Palmerton this was elevated to the dignity
of a principle, but there are few who do
not feel a sense of consequence and honor
to have their doings thus publicly recorded
for all their protestations, and with Bob
Kemp it went farther. He was inordinate-
ly proud of the publicity. It was the balm
that eased the sore of his otherwise incon-
sequential 1ife,but no one ever guessed how
vital is had become until Van Dorn sold
the Eagle and young Edgren took the edi-
torial obair. 4 A
Van Dorn had grown old in the harness,
and, like so many others in the West, his
was a real genius cramped and stunted by,
the bands liquor bad forged around it in
his early years. | Like so many other, dld
settlers of the West, t00,he bad won a thrill.
ing battle against his vice, and while Bob
Kemp was still a baby, Van Dorn had
“straightened up,”’ but the stigma always
‘remained. He mpss have felt the soil of it.
all his life, and, like so many other born
overloads of mankind ib the West, the com-
won failing of hisyonth. demooratized one
who was as heart an aristocrat,and the Eagle
politically went with the ‘‘masses,’’ who,
paradoxically, were a minority in Iowa, al-
though Palmerton ‘iteelf usually, went
strongly demooratio. Li
Being #0 much older than
was bus: natural that Van Dorn: ‘should
think of hin as “Young: Boh Kemp," and’
write of him as “*Youug Bob Kemp.” Van
Dorn’ never seemed to know that Bob Kemp
and his contemporaries ‘had grown older
than they were in the days when they were
the ‘‘young set.” Day after day, "and year
Boh Kemp, it
after year, as Boh Kemp grew balder and
grayer, Van Dorn wrote the same little
items, telling how ‘‘Bob Kemp, one of our
younger set,’’ did so and so; and how “Bob
Kemp, Lillian Vose, and several other
young people,’’ made this or that excur-
sion, or how ‘‘Boh Kemp, the popular
young bachelor,” arranged a dance, or dec-
orated a church with greens, or made a fly-
ing visit to Eastbourne.
Between the elderly ladies and men of
the Whist Set, who considered him a spoil-
ed boy, and the columns of the Eagle, Bob
Kemp was perpztually bathed in the foun-
tain of youth, and did not know he was
growing old.
I suppose there were some in Palmerton
who saw in him only a worn-out old dan-
dy, making a buffoon of himself, but they
were not his friends or those who knew
him best. To me and to all of the better
souls—I was so young then that I was
guiltless of a soul,I suppose being all stom-
ach—he was as young as he imagived him-
self. I know that I looked on him asa
meet playmate for one of my tender years.
I would have been astounded if any one
bad told me that Bob Kemp was old, just
as I would have been surprised if I had
heard that my aunt Lom was an old
maid. Age had nothing todo with my
Aunt Lou; and Bob Kemp was, equally,
just Bob Kemp.
There was a peculiar irony—or shall I
call it malice?—in the fate that made Van
Dorn break his leg on a slippery walk. He
lay in bed for months cheerfully praclaim-
ing a quick recovery, and the leg was
amputated and he failed rapidly; but not
before he bad chosen his ruccessor careful-
ly, feeling that to leave the Eagle in bad
hands would be to play a scurvy trick on
the town he loved so well. He sold the
Eagle to Edgren for less than he could have
bad from another bidder, because he felt
thas Edgren was the best man for the town.
No one missed Van Dorn so deeply as
Bob Kemp. The midnight chats in the ed-
itorial office bad become a habit with him,
and although Van Dorn had introduced
him to Edgren and he tried to continue the
chats with the newcomer, he found Edgren
too serious in his work and too busy, as
was natural for a man who bad all the
ropes of a new location to learn.
Bob Kemp climbed the dark stairs to the
office several times and received only scant,
although courteous, attention before Edgren
realized that in Bob Kemp lay the
mine of society news he had sought so
vainly.
‘Mr. Kemp,’’ he said, one night, ‘I
was told on the street today, whilel was
nosing around for news, that you were
Van Dorn’s stand-by for society gossip. I
hope you won’s go hack on the Eagle now,
just when it needs all the help it can ges to
patch out a poor editor sufficiently to fill
the chair of the big, good man it has lost.”
Bob Kemp smiled pleasantly.
“I didn’t like to press my services on
you,’’ he said, *‘but if you want my tittle-
tattle I am as eager to let you have it as
you are to get it. I get around a bit in
the social element and I like to stick by
the Eagle. Help the old bird ont,youn know.”’
He laughed, and after that they were the
best of friends. Bob Kemp never had an
enemy; at least not long.
It was not to be expected that Edgren
would look at people and sets from Van
Dorn’s point of view. Van Dorn was old;
Edgren was very young, hardly more than
a boy. To Edgren, Bob Kemp must have
seemed almost patriarchal. The entire
paper showed the change in editorship.
There was more personal news of the very
popular young people—of the Y. M. C. A.
set, and of the High-School graduates, and
those of the dancing-school age,—and less
news of the elderly men and women who
formed the Palmerton that Van Dorn knew
best.
I remember Bob Kemp coming into
“Mrs. De’s’” parlor the first evening
his name appeared in the Eagle after Ed-
gren took charge. He made us all laugh”
the ladies laughed gently as was their gen-
tle way, and “Mr. De’’ roared out his guf-
faws, and my aunt Lou, was quite hysteric-
al. Igiggled. Bob Kemp bad turned
up his coat-collar and came in with his
back bens, leaning on a cane, and with his
lips drawn in over his teeth to mimic the
toothless jaws of old age. It was a capital
take-off. His hand and his knees trembled,
and his voice trembled over the words he
mumbled out, and then he straightened
up and tarned down his collar and joined
us in our laugh. He bad a copy of the
Eagle, and he showed us a paragraph:
**Robers Kemp, one of the older set, bas
taken a praiseworthy part in the organiza-
tion of the dances of the Friday-Night Club
working untiringly to promote the pleas-
ure of our young society people.’’
His eyes fairly sparkled with the fun
this paragraph afforded him.
‘‘See what associating with ‘De’ and
Howard here bas broughs me to,’’he taunt-
ed. ‘‘Becaunce I mix with them I am brand.
ed asone of the older set! What is that
quotation?—*'He who touches pitch—’ ”’
‘Mrs. De’?! coughed her prefatory lady-
like cough and smiled.
“Why do you blame the gentlemen
only?’ she asked. ‘‘We ladies are quite
as guilty—except Miss Lou,—are we not?’’
Bob Kemp bowed in his immutable way.
‘‘Ladies are always young,’’ he said,and
‘Mis. De’’ shook her fan at him and smil-
¢d, but not ill-pleased.
1 remember, the next night, as Aunt
Lou was reading the Eagle, she said:
‘I wish the paper would nos call Bob
Kemp old. It makes me feel old too.”
I do not know what the paragraph was
that night, but Edgien could not, it seem-
ed, speak of Bob Kemp without insisting
oo his agedness. Ido not suppose he even
gave the matter a moment’s thought. It
was natural that he, a newcomer, shonld
classify Palmerton folks into ‘‘the youn,
people,” ‘‘the old people,’’ and the others
who were juss ‘“*people.’’ = He was seeking
to lay ont the puppets that meant his
news, as one separates and classifies the
suits in a whist hand, and Bob Kemp fell
into the elderly group.
The next Thursday Bob Kemp was not
with us—there was a dance or something
thas required his attendance, but Edgren’s
paragraphs appeared almost daily. * “The
following whist night the paragraphs poke
of Boh Kemp as one of the ‘“‘old ‘settlers.’
Of course he was that—mang Palmerton-
_ians much younger than he : were entitled
to admission to the Old Settlers Society,
bat Bob Kemp would have been the last
man to join the society. and peng
He was late coming to ‘‘Mrs. De’s”’ that
night; I had already bad my wafers and
my candied gi
couch in the ball when be entered. . He
wens ip to. give his greetings and then came
into the hall again to remove his overcoat,
and I was awakened. 8
pussied by she change in him. Instead of
is stiaight, military bearing, he was
cheeks Jooked flabby, and when I saw bis
eyes they were dull and tired.looking. His
whole appearance was of weariness,
When he saw me he straightened ap
with a suddenness ‘that was almost a jerk,
er, and was asleep on she:
leepy: as I was at,
the moment, and youngas I was, I was |
3 | include anys ‘grown or made
slonched forward in the. boulders and his | county And the ricre of it she be
and forced a smile and a twinkle and
pinched my cheek, as he always did, and I
heard the bravado of his jest when he went
into the parlor, but when I went with my
aunt Lon to the bedroom where the ladies
donned their wraps after the whist, I heard
them commenting with sweet concern on
the change in Bob Kemp.
‘‘He looks quite old, for sn young a
man,’’ said dear little Miss Sophy, and
‘‘Mrs. De’”’ murmured.
‘‘Overwork, my dear.”’
As if Bob Kemp ever did any real work.
He missed the next whist night, too, bus
we did not learn until the following Mon-
day that it was because he was ill.
Aunt Lou inquired every day of Dr.Tom-
bridge, who lived next door to us, but the
doctor was very grave about the case. He
said Bob Kemp seemed to have no ambi-
tion to get well, and that. there seemed to
be nothing particularly wrong. It was juss
a general breakdown.
‘“If I were not sure of the facts,’’he said,
“if I did not know Bob Kemp, so well, I
should say it was a case where stimulants
had been used for years to keep the patient
going, and that a sudden discontinuance of
the stimulants had caused a complete col-
lapse. I may be able to do something for
him yet, but I don’t know how to take
hold of the case. I can’t find the weak
spot.”’
The good doctor could not be expected
to see that the weak spot was in the col-
umans of the Eagle he read every morning.
Then there was one morning when the
doctor said that he had no hope.
‘When Aunt Lou came iato the house her
face was a little paler than usual. She
bade me go to ‘‘Mrs. De’s’’ at once and say
that she wanted her company for a visit to
Bob Kemp who was dying, and then, before
I could put on my hocd, she changed her
mind and put on her own things and took
me with her to Mrs. Fulson’s, where Bob
Kemp was boarding. ;
The widow apologized for the appearance
of the room—and the apology was needed,
—and then she left us alone with the sick
man.
I do not know what Aurt Lou had come
prepared to say. Whatever it was she was
unable to say it. I think she was terribly
shocked by his appearance. Iwas. I did
not know the man on the bed for Bob Kemp
at all. His long bair bung in strings of
white about his thin face, his cheeks were
great hollows, and his eyes were sunken,
and, oh,so tired-looking! Never, never bave
I seen such utter hopeless weakness and
dullness in the human eyes.
He evidently lacked nothing that friends
could give. The ladies of the Whist Set
bad sent dainties enough for a hospital,and
softer pillows and even flowers and books.
I believe I drew back from him frighten-
ed but he did not seem to notice me. He
looked at Aunt Lou a long time. She could
not take his band if she wished to take it;
for both his hands were under the coverlet.
It muss have been very painful for her to
stand there trying to.speak and unable to,
and presently she pat her hands over her
face and sobbed.
Bob Kemp bid not change his expression
in the least. He only shook his head slow-
ly on the pillow and eyed her wearily, and
then he said, quite as wearily:
“I’m too old! Too old!” and continued
to shake his head, and after a while again,
‘Too old.”
People cannot be held accountable for
their feelings, and my Aunt Lou felt more
deeply, or at least more powerfully, than
most, and she presently turned and ran
from the room and down the stairs moaning.
I have always felt a sense of shame in the
presence of big emotions, and I felt it then.
I kept my emotions down and trodden ous
of sight, and I followed Aunt Lou, sneak-
ingly, I dare say. She let down her thick
brown veil before we went on the street,
and we walked home silently, but once we
were in our own house she clasped me close
and wept over me, half moaning and half
speaking, calling me dear names.—By El
Parker Butler in Harper's Monthly.
An Attractive New Feature for the
Great Centre Coumty Fair.
The Great Centre County Fair having
grown to be a permanent enterprise among
the institutions of this county, the gentle-
men who have it in charge have adopted a
policy of progress. There will be no in-
difference, no standing still in the matter
of making it the great moral, social, in-
dustrial exhibition it ought to be.
Centre is a great county and shonld have
a great fair. :
That the fair association intends that it
will bave one is insured by this latest and
novel feature that is to be added.
In a building specially designed for the
purpose there will be a
GRAND COMPETITIVE TOWNSHIP EXHIBIT.
This exhibit will be open to every town-
ship in the county and in order to add in-
terest and zest to it three grand prizes will
be awarded as follows :
To the township baving the best general
exhibit, a handsome organ.
To the township having the second beet
exhibit $30 to be applied to the purchase
of charts and maps.
To the township having the third best
exhibit, the Standard dictionary.
All of these prizes are intended for the
schools of the townships and will be award-
ed in the following manner :
With each paid admission to the fair
grounds will be given one ballot which the
holder can mark and cast for the township
he or she judges has the best exhibit. When
a particular township has won. one of the
prizes, it shall belong to the school district
from which most of the exhibits making u
the general township exhibit bave been
collected.
Is is also understood that the exhibits
€ | making up the respective township displays
will also be entered for competition in sheir
respective classes, if the exhibitor so de-
sires, and in that way he will be able not
only to contribute to the success of the
schools, but to receive whatever cash awards
the exhibit may merit. ‘
This undertaking should prove one of
the most interesting and astraotive exhib-
ite ever made in this county, and it will
certainly be that if the townships enter in-
to it with the proper spirit.
Here is the opportunity to secure some-
thing useful for your schools without a
single cent of outlay further than the little
tronble in collecting and arranging she dis-
lay. fy :
? Sehool directors, echool teachers, school
children, and parents should all interest
‘themeelves in it, and the work should begin
at.once. Now is the time when the pro-
duots of she field aud garden are maturing.
The men could save these articles, the
‘women could prepare products of culinary,
bousehold and fauoy work excellence, and
the children anysbing that has merit in it.
understood that the Jisplay may
« 6 n Centre
county and the more of it the better. =
In order that there may be no andicap
because of the isolation of any particular
district, the competition will be open to
every township and borough in the county
‘with she exception of ‘Bellefonte.
Obituary Notes,
JOHN BLAIR.—On Sunday evening,
August 20th, Mr. John Blair died at his
home in Lanark, Ill., at the age of 84 years,
4 months and 14 days.. Death was the re-
sult of dropsy and old age. The deceased
was born in Centre county, Pa., where he
spent the earlier years of his life. He was
married to Miss Sarah Gilt, and in the
spring of 1871 they settled in Carroll
county, Ill. His wife survives him as does
one adopted son, Robert. The deceased
was the oldest of a family of ten and of
these two survive. These are: Robert
Blair, of Unionville, Centre county, a
brother, and Mrs. Harriet Heaton, also of
Unionville, a sister. He was one of six
brothers who served in the ‘ranks of the
union during the Civil war.
I l li
MARY CONFER McKINLEY.—This young
christian mother was horn Jan. 1st, 1880,
and passed away alter an illness of a few
weeks duration on August 29th, 1905, aged
25 years, 7 months and 20 days. The
family have resided for a few months in
Johnstown. As her illness became more
pronounced she returned to the home of
her parents, Mr. and Mrs. John A. Confer,
of Snow Shoe, where she died. She is
survived by her husband, Charles McKinley
and two small boys, the younger being but
a few months old; her parents as above
noted and two sisters, Mrs. Sarah Shank,
of Snow Shoe, and Maria M., at home; also
three brothers,Solomon,Charles and Wilbur
F., all at home. About seven years ago
she was converted and connected herself
with the Methodist Episcopal church of
Milesburg. She was a faithful christian
woman who not only endeared herself to
her family hut the entire community. On
Friday, September 1st, the body was
brought to Mileshurg where funeral serv-
ices were held in the M. E. church at 10 a.
m., conducted by pastor A. C. Lathrop and
assisted by Rev. A. 8. Carver. These serv-
ices were largely attended by many sym-
pathizing friends. Interment was made
in the Advent cemetery.
I I I
EcrLeY.—Mrs. Laura E. Fetzer Eckley
died after months of agonizing suffering on
August 31st, 1905, aged 45 years, 2 months
and 9 days. Her death occurred at her
home in Milesburg, where the family have
resided since moving from Marsh Creek
several years ago. Early in life she united
with the Milesburg Baptist church, con-
tinning in the fellowship of this church
her entire life. She is survived by her hus.
band, William Eckley, two danghters, Mrs.
Olie Shawley and Mrs. Tressie Hipple,
both of Milesburg; her mother, Mrs.
Hannah Fetzer ; three brothers, William,
Oscar, and Orvis, and four sisters, Mrs.
Alice Poorman, Mrs. Nettie Malone, Mrs.
Hattie Dunkle, and Miss Myrtle Fetzer,all
of whom are living in the vicinity of Marsh
Creek. A number of these are ill with
typhoid fever and oruld not attend the
funeral. Services were held at the Advent
church on Sunday, September 3.d, at three
o’clock p. m., conducted by pastor A. C.
Lathrop, assisted by Revs. Zeigler and
Bingham. Interment was made in the ad-
joining cemetery.
Mitro Cultures.
Nitro Cultures is the name of bacteria,
or super-phosphate, manufactured in West
Chester, and which has already been sold
to some extent in this county. The WATCH-
MAN has knowledge of at least one large
farmer who tried it the past year and who
told the writer himself that so far he had
noticed no difference in the crops grown in
goil inoculated with Nitro Cultures than
those grown in the same soil that was not
inoculated. Apropos of Nitro Cultures
the State Experiment Station has sent out
the following bulletin of the personal ex-
periments of George C. Butz, horticul-
turalist :
Early in the year the Station secured,
through third parties, specimens of the so-
called Nitro Cultures, sold by the National
Nitro Culture Company, of West Chester,
Pa. These cultures are stated to consist
essentially of the bacteria which produce
the so-called tubercles on the roots of legnm-
inous plants, and thus enable these plants
to acquire nitrogen from the air. In view
of the extravagant claims made for these
cultures, it was deemed desirable to at-
tempt to learn something of their actual
value.
Since the Station lacks a bacteriologiss,
pot experiments in the green-house were
made to ascertain whether tubercles were
actually formed on the roots under the in-
fluence of these onltures. Four different
legumes were used, namely : alfalfa, veteh,
soy bean and cow pea. The seeds of each
were inoculated with the corresponding
‘culture exactly as directed and planted in
six inch flower pots filled with sterilized
sand. A sufficient quantity of mineral
P| plant food was added to each pot but no
nitrogen, is being claimed that these bac-
teria are most active in the absence of this
element. The pots were kept in the green-
house and watered as needed.
Germination took place equally well
in all the pots. The plants made a com-
paratively small growth, but in three cases
out of four there was slight difference in
favor of the plants which were not inocu-
lated, the exception being the alfalfa. When
the plants bad nearly completed their
growsh, the roots were carefully separated
from the sand by washing and examined
with a magnifying glass for nodules. Many
sof the plants were entirely free: from them
and on none were more than a, few found,
and no material difference was noted be-
tween the inoculated ard thé uninoculated.
The exact figures were as follows : |
0
° Natingculnted.... nes 8
n w an
ocala Jiri 08
Not inoculated. ......ossemnersneessinns sons 1 af
The above experiments fail to show any
beneficial effects from the use of the nitro
cultures, While the Station would not be
justified in'passing final’ judgment on the
basis of a single experiment, our results
certainly indicate the desirability of can-
tion on the part of the farmer in investing
in“these cultures. i
Grange Encampment and Fair,
The Largest and Grandest Ever Held at Granger
Park, with a Splendid Street Fair of a
High Order.
This week arrangements for the
encampment and exhibition of the Patrons
of Husbandry, at Grange Park, Centre
Hall, were completed, and from present
indications it will be the eargest and bess
encampment and grange fair ever held a
Grange Park, which will deserve the patron-
age of the best people of the land.
The encampment will open $omorrow,
September 16th, with all the old campers,
to whieh will be added many new parties.
The arrangement of camp will be greatly
improved with new furniture and every
convenience possible. Those camping will
be from the best claes of people of town and
sountry. :
The formal opening will take place to-
morrow evening, 16th instant, with a
grand festival by Progress Grange.
The harvest home services will be held
Sunday, the 17th, 2.30 p. m., in the audi-
toriam. Dr. James W. Boal, of Centre
Hall, will preach the anniversary sermon,
and the music will he conducted jointly
by Spe choirs of all the churches of Centre
all.
Monday, the 18th, will be the opening
of the exhibition and completion of
camp.
Monday evening, ‘‘A Noble Outcast,”
by the Media Dramatic clab, in the audi-
torinm.
Tuesday, 19th, will be formal opening
of the exhibition with a carnival of all ex-
hibitors and business men that should not
be missed.
Tuesday evening, ‘‘Shaun Aroon,’”’ by
the Media Dramatic club, in the audi-
torium.
Wednesday, 20th, the Knights of the
Golden Eagle of Clinton and Centre conn-
ties will bave charge of the meetings with
| a grand parade by their order.
Wednesday evening, ‘‘Down East,” by
the Media Dramatic Club, in the audi-
torinm,
Thursday, 21st, a grand rally of all the
Granges of Central Pennsylvania, at 10.30
a.m. ‘Addresses by Rev. A.C. Lathrop,
of Milesburg, and J. T. Ailman, Secretary
State Grange.
1.30 p. m., address by W. F. Hill, Mas-
ter of the State Grange, United States Sena-
tor Boise Penrose, and Dr. B. H. Warren,
Dairy and Food Commissioner.
Thursday evening, “The Home Guard,’
by the Media Dramatic Club, in the audi-
torinm.
Friday, 22nd, 1 p. m., grand auction sale
of live stock, to which all persons are
admitted and can bring stock for sale,appli-
cation to be made to the superintendent
of the stock department or the chairman.
A nominal fee will be charged for each
animal entered, to defray the expenses of
sale. All animals for sale to be entered
by Wednesday, so as to give opportunity
to properly advertise.
Special trains will run on account of the -
Encampment and Fair at Grange Park,
Centre Hall, September 16th to 22nd, leav-
ing Bellefonte Tuesday, Wednesday and
Thursday at 10 a. m. and 6.30 p. m., stop-
ping at intermediate stations. Also leav-
ing Grange Park for Bellefonte on the
same days at 9.45 p. m.
Special trains to Coburn and all inter-
mediate stations, leaving Grange Park at
7.30 p. m. on Wednesday and Thursday.
A telegraph, telephone and distributing
postoffice will be on camp ground during
the exhibition for the convenience of the
public.
Sakhalin a Tragic Island.
Sakhalin, the island which Japan is now
taking, or, 1ather, retaking, from Russia
is the place to which Russia sends her
violent convicts. The convict at Siberia
has some liberty to console him for his
detention, but the convict at Sakhalin
none. When a party of convicts (having
been pronounced ‘‘violent’’ by the gover-
nor of the Siberian) is landed at Sakbalin
the procession to the jail is as follows:
First among the prisoners come men with
fetters on their legs and linked together in
pairs, the clanking of their chains making
a lugobrious noise. Next come balf a
dozen men each without fetters, but secur-
ed by the hands toa long iron rod. Then
follow the female prisoners and after them
the most affecting part of the whole—the
wives and children who have elected to ac-
company into exile their husbands and
fathers. Behind them rumble ‘‘telegas,”’
or rough wagons wherein are transported
baggage and those children who are too
yoang or infirm to walk.
When on the march the prisoners are al-
lowed three pounds of bread and one pound
each day, and they are not forbidden to
receive alms. But when they arrive at
their destination their lot is a pitiful one.
Their cells are damp and fungus covered,
their food is lees than the allowance dar-
ing the journey and their work in the salt
mines is most exhausting. Many of the
prisoners are very ignorant, few can read
excepting the Caucasians, but they are all
pus to the same laborious work and in the
event of their being physically unable to
perform their alloted tasks their punish-
wents are very cruel. The English ‘‘cat-
o’-nine tails’ is nothing to the terrors of
the ‘‘bodiga.”’ In this instrament of tor-
ture the prisoner is so fixed that he can
neither move nor cry out and wire thongs
bound at the end with pointed tin strike
his back at frequent intervals.
Other tortures to which prisoners are
subjected are too dreadful to write about,
and daring all these tortures the prisoner
is prevented by gags from obtaining even
the poor relief of a scream. Suiely the
horrors of the salt mines of Iletckaya are
nothing compared with the abomivations
of Sakhalin.—Pall Mall Gazette.
oi nme mie
Reduced Rates to Centre Hall, Pa.
v
To accommodate visitors to the encamp-
ment and’ exhibition of the Pations of
Husbandry, to be held at Grange Park,
Centre Hall, Pa., September 16 to 23, the
Pennsylvania Railroad Company will sell
roond-trip tickete from all stations in Penn-
sylvania, from Baltimore, New Freedom,
and ‘intermediate stations, and from Elmira
to Centre Hall, Pa.,. at special reduced
These tickets will be on sale and good
from September 16 to 23, inclusive, and
return paseage until September 26.
A ——
With the Jokers.
Teacher—Now, ' Bobby, if a rich rela-
tive should die and leave your father $10,-
000 in cash, $5,000 in honds and $2,000
{in stocks, what wonld your father get?
Bobby —Oh, he’d get a big jag and
mother’d’ take the rest away from him.—
Cincinnati Commercial Tribune. i
3 TT —— ¥
Mistress—Aud have you oracked the
nuts, Haonah? S
Maid—All hut the biggest ones, ma’am.
I couldn’ get them into my mouth.—7own
and Country. ;