ey
INK SLINGS.
—The new moon is so far around to
the south that, methinks, we will not
have any snow of consequence before
Christmas.
—If the producers, the miners or
the railroads would orly absorb that
increase in the cost of anthracite all
of the Pinchot troubles would be over.
They would have at least one plank to
stand on on a Presidental platform.
—Along with the Presidential boom
of Mr. McAdoo has been born “The
California Democrat” published once
a week at Los Angeles, Cal, and
promising to keep going at least un-
til after Mr. McAdoo gets the Demo-
cratic nomination for President.
—We want you all, no matter
where you live, to turn to page four
of this issue and read the little story
of what the Christmas seals are be-
ing sold for. It is under the head “An
Object Lesson.” If it isn’t the most
appealing prayer to you to do a little
for some one else then you haven’t the
right conscience to tug at your heart
strings.
—Evidence is accumulating to show
that the Sixty-eighth Congress is to
be one notorious for attempted tink-
ering with the constitution. Already
eight amendments have been intro-
duced in the House. Nobody will
worry much about them, however. The
country is through with ratifying con-
stitutional amendments for many
years to come.
—Pity the poor hunters who shot
spike bucks only to find the spike a
quarter of an inch too short. That
quarter of an inch cost them $100
fine. Surely this provision of the
game law ought to be changed in some
way that would not practically make
it necessary for the hunter who wants
to be safe to catch the buck first,
measure his spike, then slay him.
—We still have faith in Mayor-
elect Kendrick’s revolutionary desire
to take the Philadelphia police out of
politics by the appointment of Brig.
Gen. Smed. Butler as Director of Pub-
lic Safety of that city. But, oh! What
a shock it would be if it is later found
out that Kendrick knew, when he an-
nounced has preference, that the War
Department would not release Gen.
Butler for so long a time without sac-
rifice of his rank.
—Talking to the Lion’s club at
Pottsville, an evening or so ago, Dr.
Thomas, president of The Pennsylva-
nia State College, said “there are too
many young men trying to get white-
collar jobs by studying non-technical
subjects in college.” The Doctor evi-
dently knows that the old white- col-
lar ain’t what she used to be, but we’d
like him to tell us how many of those
engineering students who have “from
three to seven positions open to them”
immediately upon graduation have
ambitions to be jigglin’ their Adam’s
apple on a white collar as soon as they
arrive.
—Of course there are a lot of thor-
oughly straightforward men holding
public office today, but we want some-
body to show us one of them entitled
to rank with the Centre county asses-
sor who gave the occupation of one of
the citizens whom he was called upon
to register as “Moonshiner.” We are
accustomed to seeing “Gentleman” or
“Lady” after the names of some
whose occupation is more or less
problematical. In fact it is somewhat
distinctive but when it comes to being
classed as a “Moonshiner,” well—
that’s an occupation that it takes a
brave man to assign to any one.
—The Italian Premier, Mussolini,
who from many angles is viewed as
nothing more nor less than a dicta-
tor, is certainly the most courageous
figure that has come into world affairs
in many, many years. In the height
of his power he has asked and receiv-
ed the King’s decree to dissolve the
present session of the Chamber—
which is unreservedly supporting him
—in order that the country may vote
for a new one. That seems to us to
be putting the Fascist government
which he inaugurated to the acid test.
Also, it seems to us to be the slickest
political move of which we have
knowledge.
—Up to Wednesday we had, for a
period of thirty years or more, gloat-
ed in the conceit that when necessity
compelled it, we could cook as palata-
ble a “rough stuff” meal as anybody
who ever handled kitchen utensils.
It’s all off now. The last claim we
have nurtured as being good at any-
thing is gone. Through illness of the
one by nature endowed to perfectly
function in the preparation of the
family meal it fell to us to provide
something for the invalid, the boys
and “we.” We looked the refrigera-
tor over and discovered the makings
of a chicken pie that had been in con-
templation before influenza flew into
the family. We knew that there were
some left-over mashed potatoes in
cold storage also. Happy thought!
Why not have stewed chicken and
mashed potatoes? It was a mere
matter of warming up both and mak-
ing the boys think their dad about the
best cook ever. We did it. But when
the mashed potatoes came out of the
oven they were worse than the gum-
miest rarebit you ever ate and when
we carried them off far enough to
make an unobserved inspection we
discovered that we had warmed up
the crust for the planned chicken pie
instead of the mashed potatoes that
were standing in a bowl just behind it.
It’s all off! We're not a cook, zt all.
We're through with everything but
a claim to being just as good a little
fried egg and ham artist as ever lived.
ca
yy
STATE RIGHTS AND FEDERAL UNION.
VOL. 68. BELLEFONTE, PA., DEC
EMBER 14. 1923.
NO. 49.
Farmers Betrayed by Pinchot.
The esteemed Harrisburg Patriot
gives us this interesting but rather
unpleasant information: “Because
the State appropriation to fight the
Japanese beetle was exhausted by the
quarantine during the past summer,
the State Department of Agriculture
will ask federal funds from Congress
and county appropriations from coun-
ty commissioners to continue the fight
next summer, Secretary Frank P.
Willits said yesterday.” The Legisla-
ture appropriated $50,000 at its last
session to fight this formidable ene-
my of agriculture but Governor Pin-
chot cut the amount to $30,000. That
amount was expended in enforcing the
quarantine and fighting the beetle
which “was ravishing all vegetation
in southeastern counties.”
In order to bolster up Governor
Pinchot’s reputation as an economical
administrator the farmers of Penn-
sylvania were left open to an enemy
of a most destructive nature. The
menace was present when the Legis-
lature made the szppropriation. Ex-
perienced farmers urged a liberal cam-
paign of defence. But Pinchot, who
urged extravagance in other direc-
tions, adopted the “cheese-paring”
policy in this matter with the result
that it will be necessary to go begging
to Congress to protect the farms of
the State or make a forced levy up-
on the farmers themselves through
the county commissioners. Economy
of that sort is neither becoming nor
desired by the people of Pennsylvania,
farmers or others.
Mr. Willitts proposes to visit Wash-
ington to urge Congress to save our
farmers. But even if he should suc-
ceed in his begging enterprises the
help would come too late to serve the
purpose. A congressional appropria-
tion could not be made available be-
fore July, according to the statements
of those informed on the subject, and
the work of the extermination must
be done in June. The $50,000 appro-
priated at the last session of the As-
sembly would have achieved the re-
sult, for considerable progress was
made last summer. But the enemy
will have undisputed control of the
situation during May and June next
year and the farmers will pay a high
price for the cannonization of Pin-
chot as an agricultural Saint.
——We will soon find out the result
of Governor Pinchot’s second confer-
ence with the Governors of other an-
thracite using States. It was in ses-
sion in Harrisburg yesterday, (Thurs-
day), and the failure will be known
within a few days.
Cordelia Not a Deadhead.
In Governor Pinchot’s laudable am-
bition to become President the amia-
ble and versatile Cordelia “is no dead-
head in the enterprise.” She may be
over zealous in her activities or mis-
taken in the line of her endeavors but
she is certainly “on the job” in sea-
son and out, and has a tolerably wise
idea of the trend of popular opinion.
Mrs. Cordelia seems to believe that
the prohibition path is the shortest
and surest route to the White House,
and upon every opportunity she leads
the way in that direction. Possibly
she goes too strong or strikes too
high a note in her efforts to set the
procession in motion. But that is a
matter of detail which can hardly be
measured accurately at this time.
Last Sunday Mrs. Cordelia address-
ed a meeting composed of nine
churches in the Eighteenth ward of
Philadelphia. She was a trifle tardy
in the beginning, for she didn’t arrive
at the place of meeting until five
o’clock, when she had been scheduled
to speak at 3:45. But she made up
for any delinquency in time by the ve-
hemence of language. She accused
the federal authorities, meaning of
course Mr. Coolidge, who has “his
eyes sot” on a renewal of his lease of
the White House. She also took a
fall out of the judges of the courts
and the prosecuting attorneys who
she imagines are not in complete
sympathy with the strenuous efforts
of Gifford to enforce the Volstead law
in Pennsylvania or elsewhere.
Incidentally Cordelia thrusts a keen
blade between the ribs of Senator
Pepper, punctures the hide of Secre-
tary Mellon and levels a smashing
blow on the features of chairman W.
Harry Baker. “As long,” she de-
clares, “as a United States Senator, a
cabinet officer, a committee chairman,
a county boss or an ordinary ward
heeler can dictate the appointment of
prohibition agents on political
grounds, as is being done every day
throughout the country, just so long
will prohibition fail to prohibit.” This
is probably the truth, so far as it im-
plies that the Senator, the cabinet of-
ficer and the committee chairman’s
influences have been against enforce-
ment. But there is no certainty that
prohibition will ever prohibit.
———— A A ———— i ————
——Mr. Bascom Slemp is an ex-
pert at gathering in colored delegates
but if Hi Johnson’s manager lives up
to his reputation Bascom may slump.
Right but a Trifle Late.
Following the semi-official an-
nouncement that President Coolidge
is a candidate for a full term of the
Presidency his message to Congress
urging economy in expenditures of
the government was timely if not al-
together wise. Every rational mind-
ed citizen favors economy in govern-
ment and an appeal to Congress to
cut appropriations to the bone will
command approval if not tainted with
insincerity. The average voter is
likely to reason, however, that Mr.
Coolidge has been identified with the
government at Washington for some
time and until he became a candidate
for election never opened his mouth
or wrote a line in favor of rigid econ-
omy. Asa “sitter in” at Cabinet
meetings he had his chance.
Propaganda is a more popular than
potent force in politics and it looks
very much as if the President’s ap-
peal for reduced appropriations at
this time takes on the form of propa-
ganda. This impression will be in-
creased when it is remembered that
in his first annual message to Con-
gress delivered only a few days before
he intimated that ship subsidy, the
most atrocious form of graft ever
conceived, should receive the favora-
ble consideration of Congressmen.
The ship subsidy defeated by the last
Congress proposed to present to the
ship owners anywhere from fifty to
one hundred millions of dollars a year
for fifty years and the influences be-
hind it are reorganizing for another
drive in its favor.
We all want economy in govern-
ment and the desire for reduced taxes
is equally unanimous. But most of
us have been urging those measures
for many years and in so far as op-
portunity presented itself have been
talking and writing for them. But
Coolidge is a new convert to the doc-
trine or at least a new advocate and
his appeal is tainted by strong symp-
toms of false pretense. Like his
predecessor in office he would save at
the spigot by denying adjusted com-
pensation to the world war veterans
and waste at the bung by opening a
flood of expenditures entirely unearn-
ed and unworthy to the ship owners.
An intelligent public is not likely to
be impressed with such taeties.
——Probably Dr. Marx was made
Chancellor of Germany in the hope
that it would strengthen the market
for German marks in this country.
Coolidge is a Candidate.
All doubts as to President Cool-
idge’s intentions with respect to his
candidacy for the Republican nomina-
tion have been removed. As a matter
of fact there have never been any
doubts on the subject. A good many
people may have tried to conjure up
doubts, and Gifford Pinchot and Hi-
ram Johnson may have gone so far as
to entertain hopes that he would be
content with the half term acquired
by death. But Frank W. Stearns, of
Boston, the Coolidge political “angel,”
has directed another friend to defi-
nitely announce that he is a candi-
date, and that Mr. William M. Butler,
Massachusetts member of the Repub-
lican National committee, is to be his
manager.
There is really nothing about Cal-
vin Coolidge to commend him to pop-
ular favor. His message to Congress
contained no expression on any sub-
ject that could possibly command ad-
miration. Representative Nelson,
leader of the insurgent forces, cor-
rectly appraised the message when he
said “that in whatever he was deci-
sive he was wrong and in whatever he
spoke negatively he was right.” He
pleased the corporations by declaring
in favor of Harding’s proposition to
consolidate railroads and the million-
aires by approving Mellon’s plan to
cut taxes on big incomes. But he set
the war veterans against him in his
emphatic declaration against bonus
legislation of any sort. :
It may be assumed, however, that
he will be the nominee of his party
next year, for the party organization
is for him earnestly. There will be
little enthusiasm in his support for
he is not the type of man that in-
spires enthusiasm. But his nomina-
tion is necessary to the fulfillment of
the bargain entered into between the
Republican organization and big bus-
iness in 1920, and the Republican lead-
ers never willingly violate an agree-
ment with big business. If Harding
had lived no other candidate would
have had a “look in,” and Coolidge is
his legatee as well as his successor in
office. He is not a strong candidate
and unless the voters of the country
are false to themselves he will not be
elected.
—————————— —————
——On Monday the President sent
2000 nominations to the Senate for
confirmation. The recruiting service
is unusually active.
——Mr. Stearns, of Boston, seems
to enjoy the ownership of a President.
He wants to renew his lease on the
‘but “nevertheless,
title.
Senate Factions in Conflict.
The Republican factions in the
United States Senate inaugurated a
war during the session on Monday
which may develop an “irrepressible
conflict” or end in a farce similar to
that put across in the House of Rep-
resentatives a week ago. The ques-
tion in dispute is the chairmanship of
the committee on Interstate Com-
merce. Senator Cummins, of Iowa,
is the present chairman and Senator
LaFollette, of Wisconsin, the ranking
Member. Mr. Cummins is also pres-
ident pro. tem. of the Chamber and’
the contention has been set up that
he has no right to both honors. Un-
der long established custom if Cum-
mins should relinquish the chairman-
ship LaFollette would automatically
succeed to the office.
All legislation pertaining to rail-
roads and interstate commerce is re-
ferred to that committee. The ad-
ministration and the Republican or-
ganization are committed to policies
expressed in the Cummins-Esch law
and the Progressives, of whom La-
Follette is the titular leader, are
opposed to them. The railroad man-
agers, Wall Street and the special in-
terests generally are averse to plac-
ing LaFollette at the head of the com-
mittee and the insurgents, with the
exception of Capper, of Kansas, a po-
litical “porch climber,” favor his ele-
vation. The lines are clearly drawn.
Senator Cummins declares “he will
not bargain with the supporters of
Senator LaFollette.” If the other
side is equally determined a prolonged
war is inevitable.
But we don’t look for such a con-
flict of interests. Party exigencies
forbid a long drawn ouf, battle be-
tween the factions of the dominant
party and selfish ambitions and lust
for patronage will soon intervene and
effect a compromise. The presidency
of the Senate is a desirable job but
Cummins is a crafty politician and
wise enough to give up a shadow in
order to secure a substance. Wall
Street will guarantee reimbursement
for all losses incurred by giving up
one office in order to keep an undesir-
able aspirant out of another. The
pretense of contention may be kept
up for a week or two because railroad
iegislation may be deferred that long:
but in the end Cummins will be the
chairman.
—In the parlance of the street sev-
eral of the most important and meri-
torious suggestions to Congress, made
in the President’s message, are “old
stuff” and of Democratic origin at that.
His advice to put a lighter tax on
earned incomes than upon unearned is
exactly what Senator Harris, of Geor-
gia, Democrat, offered in his amend-
ment to the revenue bill in 1921. Mr.
Coolidge then presided over the Sen-
ate and the Harris amendment was
voted down by thirty-six to twenty-
one because Senator Penrose, then
chairman of the finance committee,
said it couldn’t be done.
—Thus far, it is stated in Harris-
burg, one-sixth of the commissions is-
sued to Notarys Public this year have
been to women. We're right here to
bet that the percentage will be far
greater next year. The women can
and will answer the Governor's
twelfth question as to their qualifica-
tions without as much sacrifice as the
men applicants. You know what the
twelfth interrogatory is, of course. 1t
is: Will you agree to abide by the
constitution, especially the Eighteenth
amendment.
——————— A ——————
——Up to this writing the Ink
Sling man of the “Watchman” has
not been buried under saddles of ven-
ison or deluged with sherry dressing,
notwithstanding,”
as the Hon. James Schofield would
say, a savory roast reached this office
last week from the first venison kill-
ed in the vicinity of Pine Grove Mills
on the opening day of the season. The
buck was brought to earth by George
Burwell and we are indebted to Capt.
W. H. Fry for our share of it.
Mr. Coolidge is exceedingly
generous in his praise of his prede-
cessor in office. He is also doing his
best to make the war veterans agree
with him that the death of Mr. Hard-
ing was a national calamity.
If Senator Pepper, Secretary
Mellon and chairman Baker are dele-
gates at Large the fourth seat would
hardly be comfortable for Mrs. Pin-
chot.
——Premier Stanley Baldwin may
adhere to his policy of tariff taxa-
tion but the voters of England haven’t
given him much encouragement.
Governor Pinchot’s opinion of
the morals of Philadelphia is not flat-
tering but in view of the majority
that city gave him is justified.
——It was unusually long between
revolutions in Mexico but the one now
in progress may last long enough to
make the average.
Our Pet Mania of “Be It Enacted.”
From the Philadelphia Public Ledger.
Congress was not twenty-four hours
old, the Senate and House had not or-
ganized, before the usual flood of pro-
posed laws, resolutions and “be it en-
acteds” overwhelmed both Houses.
Days before the annual message of
the President was delivered to the
Congressional joint session the stam-
pede to rush the legislative gates was
on. Upward of 600 bills poured into
the legislative hoppers fore the
House had a Speaker or the Senate
was organized.
Congress passes laws by the hun-
dreds and they are offered by the
multiple thousands at every session.
A vast majority of these bills are
worse than worthless. They repre-
sent the halfbaked ideas of some half-
baked Legislator or some of his half-
baked constituency who feel the
American urge to pass a law about
something.
Many of them are introduced “by
request.” ‘Some of them are the work
of cranks and crack-brained folk.
Others are merely piffling and harm-
less arrangements of words. Many of
them are dangerous proposals.
When the Constitution is found to
bar the way of some of these legisla-
tive monstrosities and panaceas their
advocates demand that the Constitu-
tion be amended and remolded nearer
their hearts’ desire. In 136 years
there have been 3063 proposals that
the Constitution be amended. That
many have been actually introduced in
one branch or other of Congress.
Every generation has its own breed of
tinkerers. :
In the Sixty-seventh Congress 109
of these proposals were offered in the
form of bills or resolutions. That rec-
ord probably will be bettered in the
Sixty-eighth, for their is little sign
that we are convalescing from our re-
cent spells of amendment fever. The
undergrowth of the legislative woods
in Washington is crawling with
would-be amenders.
all cast down by the fact that only
nineteen amendments have been ap-
proved since the adoption of the Con-
stitution.
Americans have a passion for law-
making and law-changing that is not
matched by a passion for law-enfore-
ing. In Congress and the forty-eight
State Legislatures tens of thousands
of enactments and resolutions are
considered every legislative year. Our
State statutes have swollen to the
size of unabridged dictionarigsig. our
of city directories and our federal
statutes are as weighty as the
Domesday book.
This goes on in the face of a grow-
ing feeling that we need vastly few-
er laws and vastly better enforcement
of those we have. A great flood of
these enactments, proposed and pass-
ed, may be traced to a growing class-
mindedness in American life that has
shown itself in Legislative blocs.
Many of them are due to a kind of
national shiftlessness and political la-
ziness due to the dying of our self-
governing instincts. If a problem
worries us, we want to pass it on to
our Harrisburgs, Albanys and Tren-
tons and, finally, Washington.
“There ought to be a law” is a fa-
miliar phrase of American speech.
“Pass a law,” is the American panacea
for all ills, social, moral, industrial
and economic.
Naturally enough, it has come
about that we are saddled with a cast-
iron set of bureaucracies that look
after everything from hog cholera to
whooping cough and from brown
bears to babies. As a matter of
course, we have a legion of inspectors,
auditors, commissioners, collectors,
enforcers of this-and-that and third
aniston sub-deputies, world without
end.
The Nation is never quite easy in
its mind while Congress is in session
and the swelling stream of laws
breeds that uneasiness. It is being
crushed under a weight of statutes
and confused by new and old legisla-
tive mazes. The mills of Congress
may grind slowly. They do not grind
exceeding small and they do grind
steadily. We have just completed the
longest vacation from law-making
permitted us for years, but the annu-
al and well-nigh unending manufac-
ture of more laws has begun again.
About all we can do is hope for the
beg 2nd yearn for an early adjourn-
ment.
mn —— ese
Not a Closed Incident.
From the Philadelphia Record.
President Coolidge is, of course,
only expressing his own personal
opinion when he says that “our coun-
try has definitely refused to adopt and
ratify the covenant of the League of
Nations,” and that “the incident, so
far as we are concerned, is closed.”
He is entitled to that view, but there
are many millions of Americans who
are just as firmly attached to the
opinion that the incident is not closed,
and that it never will be closed until
the issue is settled definitely by the
United States assuming its proper
place among the nations of the world.
Calvin Coolidge may think that this
country has “definitely refused to
adopt and ratify the covenant but
much more than half of his fellow-
countrymen think differently. As an
issue in American politics the League
promises to be a bone of contention
until right has triumphed over polit-
ical partisanship and the United
States decides to do what it should
have done four years ago.
AA ———————
—TFor all the news you should read
i the “Watchman.”
They are not at
‘municipal ordinances ‘to the {hickiess
'|SPAWLS FROM THE KEYSTONE.
Dispatches from Elmira say Charles
Shires, aged 53 years, residing in Willams-
port, was robbed of $500 by companions
‘during a drinking party in that city.
—Herman Geska, of Uniontown, convict-
* | ed of attacking Mrs. Myrtle Boyd, a Con-
nellsville nurse, is' to serve from five to
ten years in the western penitentiary.
—The Altoona school board has author-
ized a bond issue of $250,000 for the com-
pletion of the Roosevelt Junior High
school and for the purchase of sites for
new Senior and Junior schools.
—George Trueman, aged 9 years, is a pa-
tient at the Lewistown hospital, with a
broken leg and injured head, received
when he was run down by an automobile
near his home at Honey Creek, near
Reedsville, Sunday night. :
—The Eagle Fire company, of York, Pa.
will treat 1,000 children with candy, fruit
and toys on Christmas morning. A large
Christmas tree is also being planned by
the South End fire fighters. The tree is
to be transported from the Bald Hills, by
members of the Eagle deer club.
—Five workmen were injured by an ex-
plosion of molten metal in the cupola of
the National Radiator works at New Cas-
tle last Friday afternoon. E. Stirpe and
Joe Tefe are in the hospital badly burned
and injured while W. Branden, Tony Mo-
resso and Joe Devitto, were taken to their
homes, not being seriously injured.
—Hearings on the claims of John L.
Kuhn, the State printer, will be resumed
December 20th by Auditor General Lewis,
and the sum of over $36,000 is hanging in
the balance over the printing of the hunt-
ers’ license tags. The State contention is
that it is special work and not within the
printing contract, but Mr. Kuhn claims he
should have had it.
—“My husband bought me for $300. He
paid the money te my aunt,” Mrs. Abra-
ham Barket, of Pottsville, told the police
on Saturday. Friday night Mrs. Barket
says her husband, a well-to-do merchant,
pulled her out of bed by her hair when
she disagreed with him. Barket is 44
years old, and his wife is 18. The husband
was held under bail for court.
—Charles Swogger, aged forty years,
member of a prominent family of breeders
of thoroughbred Holstein cattle, shot and
probably mortally wounded his mother,
Mrs. Oliver Swogger, sixty years of age,
at their home in Lackawanna township,
seven miles east of Sharon, on Friday
night, when she refused to give him mon-
| ey. Then he committed suicide.
—@G. L. Randall, arrested at Ridgway
Friday night charged with forging checks,
was given a hearing before Justice Zelt in
St. Marys and in default of $2,000 bail is a
prisoner in jail at Ridgway. His case
will come before the January term of Elk
county court. Randall, who gave his resi-
dence at Williamsport, is wanted in that
city and also in Milton and Sunbury on
similar charges.
—Harry M. Benjamin, owner of the Ben-
jamin Motor company, at Hazleton, a
graduate of Lehigh University and mem-
ber of the Hazleton Kiwanis club, died
late Sunday night at the State hospital
after being overcome with gas fumes in his
garage. About seven years ago he had a
narrow escape from death when his father,
David Benjamin, was killed in an accident
at the Eberdale anthracite coal strippings.
—The body of Andrew Mauza, 54 years
old, was found on Saturday near the Fer-
ris Heights” school” puildifig in Columbia
county. His head was crushed. Eight
hundred dollars he had with him is miss-
ing. Mauza was with two men the even-
ing previous and they are being sought.
The murder is the first in Columbia coun-
ty in six years. Mauza had been a resi-
dent of Berwick for about thirty years.
The police believe a club or stone was used
to commit the murder.
—An all-day search by Constable Graff,
of Lancaster, for a man wanted for larce-
ny ended last Friday evening, when he
found his quarry in the county jail. Con-
stable Groff was armed with a warrant for
the arrest of John L. Smith, of No. 33
east Walnut street, charging him with
robbing his room-mate, Raymond 8. Wil-
son. While the constable was searching
for him Mayor Musser, in police court,
was sentencing Smith to ten days in jail
for disorderly conduct.
—Close to a million dollars is said to
have been invested by retail grocers in
Cambria and Somerset counties in the
American Grocers’ society, against which
bankrupt proceedings have been institut-
ed in Newark, N. J. Vice Chancellor
Backes having granted a rule against the
company returnable this week. According
to the petition asking for the appointment
of a receiver, the liabilities of the compa-
ny are $2,500,000 and its assets not more
than $150,000. The society claims assets in
realty to the amount of $443,000.
—Flames from a match she had struck
to light a lamp in her room are believed
to have caused the death of Mrs. Sarah
Lydia, 67 years old, who was found burn-
ed to death last Thursday at the home of
her brother, Samuel Hays, of Antrim
township, Franklin county. The woman's
body was found behind the door in her
room at the Hays home. The lamp she is
believed to have lighted was burning, but
the chimney was lying on the floor. Mrs.
Lydia was subject to heart attacks, and
it is believed that she suffered such an at-
tack while lighting the lamp. Hays was
attracted to her room by the smell of
smoke.
—By the use of X-rays, which showed
the callous left where the bone had been
knit in a broken leg, the ownership of an
Airedale dog was established in Mount
Pleasant, Westmoreland county. Two men
claimed the dog was theirs, and the right-
ful owner studied for some means by
which he might prove his claim. Then he
remembered that his dog once suffered a
broken leg and that Dr. McNish, of Mount
Pleasant, reduced the fracture. Dr. Mc-
Nish said that the dog was but six
months’ old when he attended it and that
he could not positively identify it. He
suggested the X-rays and the picture
showed the leg had been fractured.
—When citizens assembled at the First
Reformed church at Pottsville, on Monday,
to hear a prohibition lecture they were in-
formed that it would be impossible to
hold the meeting, as the Rettig brewery
next door, which furnishes the steam for
heating the church, had shut off the pipes
on learning an anti-saloon meeting was to
be held. William Shugars, president of
the brewery, and Charles Ost, superintend-
ent, said they did not wish to discommode
the church members, but they did not see
how they could consistently heat a build«
ing where a meeting was to be held to at-
tack their business. The meeting was
cancelled, and the heating service was then
resumed.