The Centre reporter. (Centre Hall, Pa.) 1871-1940, May 24, 1894, Image 3

Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page. It is also available as plain text as well as XML.

    To Summer Land.
My bird has flown to summer land
Be still, sad heart,
O'er stream and forest, tiekl and sand,
To southern seas of summer land,
My bird has flown.
My bird sings on where roses bloom
Be still, sad heart.
'Mid orange groves, where grasses plume,
Far, far south of winter's gloom,
My bird sings on.
And 1 am left 'mid ice and snow
Be still, sad beart.
With heart so cold, ah, none can know
Save those who wait in land of snow,
Alone! alone!
QO, happy bird, by summer sea,
Sing on, sing on,
And send au echo back to me
O'er field and forest, stream and sea,
Of thy sweet song.
An echo, only this to say,
Sing on, sing on,
That, guided by thy song some day
My chastened soul shall find its way
To supnmer land.
{New York Observer.
THE COUNTESS REIFSKY.
BY EVAN EVANS.
Au ugly, muggy, chilly evening, in
spite of the fact that it was midsum-
mer; but then I had found that
weather in St. Petersburg was not to
be depended on. The streets were
deserted, save when the desth-carte
rattled along vanmindful of their
ghastly burdens. The city clocks had
struck ten, and 1 was harrying home
—or rather to my den—to write my
“special” to an American daily. Cor-
respondents’ letiers are generally built
upon a frail foundation of truth, but
now, in these cholera times, 1 could
hardly find time, or words strong
enough, to depict the horrors I saw
on every side. I had delayed writing
a little longer than usual, so that I
might go more deeply into details, for
the benefit of my horror-loving coun-
trymen, and I was in haste. I was
obliged to go through that part of the
city most infected with the swfal
plague, where the air seemed recking
with infection, but being pretty well
scasoned, I did mind it very
much. As I hurried along I saw,
standing under a lamp, whose dim rays
shed light but a few feet around it, a
woman dressed in white.
not
As I passed her she stepped forward
and said, with a tone of recogaition,
+] have been waiting for you.”
I paused, and to my surprise recog-
nized my beautiful friend, the Coun-
toss Reifsky, the toast of a hundred
ball-
me fast and furiously for some weeks
—why I could not imagine.
With reproof iu every accent I ex-
claimed :
“Madame, what are you doing here
in this deadly stmosphere, and alone,
at this boar?”
“I have been waiting for you?’ she
repeated, simply.
she know I was coming this way wh
myself.
1 assumed a severe alr.
“Youn must not stay here.”
“No; I mean to take you with me
to the final meeting of a society to
which I belong. Tonight we dis-
band, and I want yon to be there to
describe the affair with your versatile
pen to your great American people.
You know we Niliilists are so misrepe
resented. No, you need not shrink
away; you will come to no harm.
Perhaps you do not enjoy being with a
‘suspect.” Tonight the far-reaching
grasp of the Czar himself wonld find
it hard to reach me, and I shall place
you beyond his power, too. But we
must harry.”
Half reluctant, and wholly fasci-
nated, I allowed her to lead mo along
through the deserted streets until we
came to & small, lew building, wilel
showed not a ray of light. Here she
tapped softly. The door swung back
on noiscides hinges. Along a dimly-
lighted hall we went to auother door,
which opened in the same quiet fash.
ion, and we stood in the dezzie and
glitter of a ball room.
In my business suit I ought to have
Lolt embarrassed, bat I did not, for [
‘v7as too much impressed by the scene
before me.
It reminded me of what I had
kvown in my younger days as “phan.
tom parties,” at which youth and
maiden draped themselves in sheets.
Yet that memory should not Lave
given me a fo.ling of repugnance, for
of those happy days I had the pleas
~antost recollections. As I looked
closer I recognized the fact that these
people were masquerading in grave
clothes—~mocking the destroyer which
held the city in its grasp; and a great
horror filled me.
Come it in whatever fashion It may, !
by pestilence or in Siberian nines, we |
do not fear it. Swift or slow, it mat~
ters not to us.”
“Yes, madame; 1 have heard that |
you Nihilists, if I must clues you among
them, care not how swift be the death |
to which you consign your victims.”
“1 sce yon do not approve of our |
methods, but you see we know of no |
other way more honorable. With us!
the ond justifies the means, but when
we must send death it is always
quick.”
«Not always.
work surely.”
A gleam in my fair companion's
eyes warned me I was on dangerous
ground, but it was goue a'most in-
stantly, and she continued:
“Now, in tha case of the late prime
minister—-when his fate was sealed,
we decided
I caught her arm, not knowing what
damaging revelation she might make.
‘Countess, you are insane, In your
country walls have ears,”
“Monsieur, these walls are safely
guarded. But we iss the music and
the dance.”
Never, so long as memory lasts,
shall I forget that evening. Noble and
artisan met on equal ground. Social
distinctions seemed for the time being
obliterated. Brain, wit, and a com-
mon cause were the passports to this
brilliant society. Words were spoken
which would condemn a man to BSi-
beria for a lifetime. No one seemed
to notice me very munch, beyond a
courteous recognition, and as I looked
among the guests, I saw my brother
correspondent and compatriot, John
McPherson, wh> was alsoclad ina
business suit, and who also seemed,
like myself, a visitor.
The hours flew past. I thought
somewhat uneasily of my neglected
letter, but could not drag my reluctant
feet away from the fascination of the
scene.
The musie grew faster, and more
weird were the strains. My feet fair-
ly ached to tread to their measure, but
something held me back.
The hour grew late, the lights
burned dim, still the dancers kept up
their dizzy whirl. The music rose
and fell, now wailing, now entreat-
ing; I felt I must yield to it. My
beautiful countess put her white arm
on mine. I feit her warm breath
sweep me cheek.
“Como with me;
sorrow. Name and fame are worlh
little. Together we should be for.
ever happy.”
I looked into her great seductive
brown eyes, and almost yielded, but
before my vision came the little prim*
rose-faced girl I had left in a New
England village. I saw her as I had
Lidden her good-by, and I pushed my
semptress back.
The white arm fell, the music
stopped with a crash, the decorations
faded, the smiling faces vanished —
Dombs don't always
forget toil and
cry of horror I saw death
LVery countenance.
in my ear:
“When you are racked with pain
a cholera bed, remember a
written on
1heard a hissing
The floor swam. [I turned and fled.
At the door I met McPherson. Out.
side the gray dawn had broken; 1
turned to see where we were, and I
recognized the grim walls of the
morgue.
An hour later Mac and I were
counted among the plague victims,
burried to the pest house. I pulled
through, almost by a miracle; he
poor fellow, found a nameless grave.
Some weeks later, when I looked
over the piles of papers which had
accumulated in my absence, I read the
notice of the death of the Countess
Riefsky on the 17th of Jaly—the day
of my strange adventure.
1 accounted for McPherson and my-
self being honored to such an extent
in this way, because wo had both
written letters home exposing some
Nihilistic plots, and even then 1 had
letters and material enough for ure
other article in my pocket. Heuce the
revenge.
1 did not tell the little girl at home
of her brilliant Nihilist rival. I never
like to shatter a faith. [Frank
Leslic’s lllustrated.
Interior of the Mormon Temple,
The interior of the Temple has an
air of mystery about it. Up to date
none but the faithful have been ad.
mitted to ite sacred precincts, and as
none of the inquisitive Gentile report.
ers aro allowed to enter, the newspa.
per descriptions of the inside are ine
accurate, and chiefly tho result of the
imagination of the ubiquitous scribes,
As a matter of fact,there are portions
of the interior which are as sacred as
Te Haig of Notas inthe dave
of the Tumpie ausetruoied by the
The basement is divided into soveral!
to the highest degree of perfection,
The font is of bronze, and, Jike that
nso
faces
south.
aparts
of twelve oxen,
bronze, which stand witn their
to the east, west, north and
Grand and impreesive as this
ment is, it is mediocre when compared
with some of those on the upper floors.
One in particular is deserving of
special mention.
and gold is this magic chamber, while
the floor is of blocks of wood not more
portions of the world by the mission-
aries sent out by the church,
more beautiful. White and gold are
eye. The topesirics are all of the
purest white, and are rare and costly.
All
finest onyx, delicate in tint,
drive a dealer in this product insane
with envy,
upon the magnigcent
hour is said to be worth a vear
motto ‘Holiness to
Evefy handle of
aud the
Lord.”
been specially made for the
In the basement ull the fixtures,
including the locks on the doors, the
bolts and hinges, are of brass. On the
first floor they are of plated gold, on
the sccond plated silver, on the third
old silver, and above that of bLronze.
The wooa work is of oak, all seasoncd
and massive in appearance.
The cost of the temple is a question
which even the most astute follower
of Brigham hesitaies to answer. It has
been estimated all the way from £6,-
000,000 to $12,000,000, The
figure is believed by those who are in
a position to know to be thie eorrect
one.— [Harper's Weekly.
pose.
intler
——
Do Trees «Know™
It is sometimes hard to
able to do what they do mn
parent for walter light,
without special consciousness or intel.
ligence; and yet we know they possess
no such qualities,
There are few farmers who have not
seen the sprouts of potatoes in their
cellars find the way to the knot bole in
a board, and extend their growth
through it in search for sunlight.
following case, recorded by a Califor.
nia paper, tells what a root did:
The root of a tree followed the brick
casing of a sewer until it reached a
search or
above the level on which the root was
growing, was a small hole
through to the other side. For this
hole the root made a ‘bee line,”
through it and ran down on the other
side, where finally it found the water
it sought.
The questions are asked by the jour-
nal which records the case, “How did
the tree know of the hole in the wall?
How did it know of the water ou the
other side 7”
The snswer made by a botanist isa
very simple one. The tree did not
Know anything about the hole or the
water, for trees do not **know” any.
thing. But they send out their roots
in every direction, Those which find
moisture and nuirition grow and
passed
and waste away.
The root in the case in question was
probably turwed upward by the wall,
80 that its discovery of the hole was
purely accidental. But once through
that aperture its discovery of the
water below was perfectly nataral.
The roots of trees do “know” not
or their own consciousness, but as a
result of countless ages of growth in
their kind—hiow to push on in the di.
rection of water. — [Youth's Compan.
fon,
The Milky Way.
During the lust few days Professor
Barnard, of the Lick Observatory, has
been engaged in photographing in de.
tail the Milky Way. When the plates
are finished, which will not Le for
three years, it is expected that the
facts revealed by thom will rove
lutionize the old conceptions of this
remarkable phenomenon. The text
books declare that the Milky Way
probably contains 20,000,000 suns;
but Professor Barnard estimates that
the camera will record the presence of
at least 500, C00,000, with the certainty
that there must be a still larger num
York Tribune.
A LOCUST PLAGUE.
A Province in China Devastated
by the Insects.
Queer Efforts Made by the
People to Dispel the Scourge.
The great Province of Klang-Soo,
China, is being devastated by locusts.
Consul Jones, at Chin-Eiang, sends
the State Department an account of
the curious efforts made by the afflicted
sections to dispel the scourge. Some
of the methods resorted to are as
striking as the suggestions offered to
the Kansas people when they were
suflering from a similar visitation
When the locusts
make their appearance in one of these
Chinese districts there is consternation
among the unfortunate peasantry, who
assemble in the fields with wild clamor
armed with long
bamboos with streamers attached, and
vainly endeavor to drive off the terrible
lovaders who are settling down in
myriads and devouring their crops be-
fore their eyes, Every leaf and twig
is covered thick, giving the appes.-
ance of some hideous yellow fruit or
plant,
There is a carious and widespread
istence of a ‘‘king” locust— Wang,"
who hovers
regions of the
character,
upper
grations of the different swarms, At
some places the leading officials have
to the king of the locusts in order that
he might be influenced {o spare their
localities,
“1 know of few sights,”
Consul,
wriles the
“more extraordinary than a
swarm engaged ln pairing. The air
is filled with clouds of drift-
ing, circling, crossing aud recrossing,
with a faint, whirring noise, and get-
ting on the ground in (%ousands and
couples. The ground carpeted
locusts
is
step without crunching heaps of them
under your feet, while thousands
more star. up in pattering volleys
against your legs, hands and face,”
The eggs are deposited in holes
drilled by the female an ineh or more
deep in the ground, The time re-
quired for hatching depends entirely
on the temperature. In hot weath,
er the new brood begins to make its
appearance at the end of a week. At
this stage they are very small, black
and active, making extraordinary
bounds by means of their muscular
hind legs. They are greedy feeders
and grow rapidly. By the eighth or
ninth day wings have budded and the
color begins lo change, yellow spots
appearing, and in about three weeks
or & mouth they are full grown.
The destruction, by suitable meas-
ures, of this formidable pest, involv.
ing, as it does, the prevention of fam.
ines, fever epidemics and riots, is =
matter of grave public concern. One
the penalty of remissuess or failure to
destroy the enomy.
Consul Jones says the Chinese con-
is a “calamity from heaven, and that
there is no help for it.” Chinese re-
cords chronicle many instances of the
appearance and the calamities inflicted
by the loecuits in former times, but
they have no peculiarly effective mothe
ods of destroying them. The Govern.
ment usually lssues proclamations
ordering out the soldiers and ene
couraging the farmers to destroy
them. The latter are given a bounty
for their destruction.
The soldiers are used against the
locusts, with their officers at their
head, as against an adverse army in
the fleid, Instead of a gun or a lance,
however, each soldier is armed with a
coarse hempen bag, attached to a bam.
boo pole, which, with wide-open
mouth, is waved back and forth
among the swarms until filled, when
they are killed and the action re-
newed,
The farmers use large brooms made
of bamboo twigs aud other bushes,
and each armed with this weapon goes
forth to slaughter. When killed and
collected, they are paid for by weight,
which 1s at the rate of four cents per
poand. The locusts’ eggs are dug up
and paid for on a similar scale,
04d Facts About Beasts and Birds,
only in this particular, and in being
almost voiceless.
Among recent breeds of pigeons is
the parior tumbler, which has not only
lost the power of flight, but has very
nearly lost that of walking as well.
Lis queer motions when it attempts to
walk have given it its name, the
tumbler.
“As thick as the hair on a dog's
back” expresses nothing in Mexico,
of hair on its back or anywhere else.
superfluous,
divested him of it. Nor does
hour” in that country. On the cone
of laying in a store of honey, and de-
generates into a thoroughbred loafer,
cetacean genus
long.
hardly three
*‘As cunning as a fox” would have
sounded idiotic to the discoverers
Kamchatka. They found foxes
large numbers, but so
they had never before seen an enemy,
that they could be killed with clubs.
The ¢*birds of a feather” that «flock
together” do not belong to the penguin
kind of stiff down. Another penguin
pecusiarity is that it swims not on but
under water, never keeping more than
its liead out, and, when fishing, coming
to the surface at such brief and rare
intervals that an ordinary observer
would almost certainly mistake it for
a fish,
Ducks swim the world over, bat
geese do not. In South
domestic species is found that cannot
excel an ordinary ben in aquatic ace
complishments.
in a country where water is only
found in wells that it has Jost ite
aquatic tastes and abilities entirely.
“As awkward as a crab” does not
apply ovr some of the South
Islands, for a crab is found there that
| not only rans as fast as any
man,
average
but climbs trees with the ease of
a schoolboy.
Where Is Cup Jackson?
One gentleman who visited St Louis
this spring after an absence sbroad of
nearly thirty years asked to be taken
to Camp Jackson, where,
plained, his son was shot during the
“late unpleasaniness.”
“To tell you the truth, I really don’t
know where Camp Jackson was,”
guide explained.
a good many years,
Jackson
“I have lived here
and heard Camp
spoken of repesiodly, but
its exact location.”
“I can find it easily enough,” was
the reply.
Olive street road,
west of the old city limits at Nine-
teenth street.”
within four or five miles of Nineteenth
street,” the guide promptly explained,
““and if you are right as lo location,
Camp Jackeon is the site of some of
the best residences in St. Louis, with
several merchant millionaires residing
in them.”
Inquiries proved that the visitor
knew more about the topography of the
city than his guide, for what was Camp
Jackson during the war is now a
thickiy-settiod residence-section, three
or four miles east of the city limits,
and with tens of thousands of houses
beyond it.— [Lippincott’s,
————
Whale-01l Crullers,
Somebody mentioned crullers. “Well,
I reckon you never tasted real crullers,”
said an old follower of the sea, In
the days when whales were plentiful
and great rivalry existed between the
New Bedford sailors it was customary
for the captain of a vessel to offer his
crew a barrel of flower, about twenty
pounds of sugar and a barrel of oil
out of the first whale caught. How
that prize used to make the old salts
work! And when they got the whale
the e20k was called in and there were
crullers «ll you couldn't rest. Never
tasted whale-oil crullers, you say?
{ Then you never will. The whale busi-
ness 18 almost done for. Whales are
getting scarcer every year. They had
no protection, and man has nearly ex
terminated them. [New York Tri
bane.
A Small Dividend,
“I hoar your venture on the Stock
was not very successful.
Didn't you got anything out of it?”
«Oh, yea, I got experience and the
sympathy of my friends,
IIA SOM OI.
The earliest library was that of
*
Tho Seale Man,
8ay, In a hut of mean state
A light just glimmers snd then is gone,
Nature Is seen to hebitate,
Pat forth and then refraot her pawn;
Sav, in the alembic of an eye
Haughty Is mixed with poor and low ; ,
Bay, Truth herseif Is not so high
But Error laughs to ses her so;
Bay, all that strength failed in its trust;
Bay, all that wit crept but a span;
Bay, 'tis a drop spliled in the dust.~—
And then say brother—then ssy man!
~{ Dors Reade Goodale, in Lippincott.
mec aa——
HUMOROUS,
The rose that all are praising is now
the shad roes.
It is doubtful if a blind man can
possess the prophetic gift; he is no
Men who never take e stand any;
where else frequently have to take’
one in a street car,
He—1 think Miss Trill would make
Is Miss Trip s girl of means? Phipps
==Yes, but what I am trying to dis-
it is yes or no she
means.
This difference still lingers
Among women in ail lands:
The rich ones ring their fingers
And the poor ones wring their hands,
What nonsense it is to say a man is
When a man is
becoming bald it is quite against his
Chipper—I often hear people speak
about slow poisons. Do you know
what they are? Lipper—Yes, meals
Friend—Goling to try for a prize es-
say this term, Sawyer? Medical Stu.
dent (lowering his voice)—'Sh! Yes
Miss Hart—Which do you think is
the bride or the
Mr. Oldbatch— The groom,
be a groom.
Engagement times will soon be here,
Ana now the prudent lover
Fudeavors to get back that ring,
That he may use it over,
He—Deali me, don't you know, Miss
Sweetbrier, that when the cleciric caw
struck me it knocked me silly? She—
Poor fellow, how long ago that must
«This chicken,” said the boarder
timidly. “That is a Piymouth Rock,
sir, said the frowning landlady. “Ah!
Thank you, ma'am. I knew it was a
rock of some Kind.”
“Well, my dear, how would Farmer
Brown suit you for a husband? He
seems uncommon swoet on you late. |
ly?’ «Perhaps so, father, but his hair
is 80 red that—" «True, true, my
child; but you should recollect that be
bas very litte of it.”
Queer Diet of a Dog.
Mr. Thomas Morgan, of Kentish
Town, wondered for a long time why
his garden remained desolate, notwithe
lavished upon it, and why his neigh
bor's dog was always so plump sad
fat, until he discovered the cause and
nately fond of tulips, hyacinths, or
chids, and other flowers, and was in
the habit of visiting the floricnltural
preserves and eating up all the blooms
he could reach. He did not care about
grass or boxwood, or any of the come
mon sorts, but the moment he saw
Mr, Morgan plant a black tulip ora
rare orchid his eyes sparkled with
the feast in store, and the moment
the plast blossomed he devours
ed it, stalk and all. For three
years this went on. The dog was
insatiable. He was a kind of walking
botanical garded, and still had always
an appetite for more. Mr. Morgan
dared not kill the dog, bLecanse he
might be held liable for its walune,
which, of course, would not be taken
at his own appraisement, so he sned
Mr. Hall, its owner, in the Bloomsbury
County Court, for the damage done to
the garden. [London Telegraph,
One of Nature’s Economies,
Birds with long legs always have
short tails. Writers on the flight of
birds have shown that the only use of
a bird's tail is to serve as a rudder
during the act of flight. When birds