Centre Democrat. (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1848-1989, September 02, 1880, Image 6

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    Woodman, Fell TW
Woodman, fell that tree,
S|>aro not a single bough;
In youth it larruped me
And I'll get even now.
'Twas my stern lather's hand
That made it feel no hot.
And though you think it grand,
Woodman, spare it not.
The old familiar tree,
Whose branches were cat down
And spread all over mo-
Woodman, hew it down!
Lay on thy vigorous stroke!
Cut oat its earth bound ties;
Oh, slash that onery oak
That filled my soul with sighs.
Whon I, an idle boy,
llookey often played,
Jn all my gushing joy
With Tom's two sisters strayed,
My mother caught me here;
My lather pressed his hand—
Forgive this foolish tear
But don't lot that oak Btand.
My back would ache and sting.
My dear old woodman friend,
And hero the blows did ring
As I was forced to bend.
Down with it, woodman, brave,
Leave not a single jot,
While I my old wounds lave—
Inflicted on this spot.
—Keokuk Gait dig.
NICODEMUS DODGE.
When I was a boy in a printing office
in Missouri, a loose-jointed, long-legged,
tow-headed, jeans-clad, countrified cab
ot about sixteen lounged in one day, and
without removing his hands from the
depths of his trousers' pockets, or taking
off his faded ruin of a slouch hat, whose
broken brim hung limp and ragged about
bis ears like a bug eaten cabbage leaf,
stared indifferently around, then leaning
0 his hip against the editor's table, ciuesod
his mighty brogans, aimed at a distant
fly from a crevice in his upper teeth,
laid him low, and said with composure:
" Wha's the boss?"
" I am the boss," said the editor, fol
lowing this curious bit of architecture
wonderingly along up to its clock face
with his eye.
" Don't want anybody fur to lean the
business, 'tain't likely P"
"Well, 1 don't know. Would you
like to learn itP"
" Pap's so po' he can't ran me no mo',
so I want to get a show somera, if lean,
'tain't no difference what—l'm strong
and hearty, find I don't turn my back on
no kind of work, bard nor soft."
" Do you think you would like to learn
the printing business?"
"Well,l don't re'lyk'yer adurnwhat
I do learn, so'* I git a ch&noe fur to make
my way. I'd jist as soon learn printVs
anything."
"Can you readP"
"Yes-middlin'."
" Write P"
" Well. I've seed people could layover
me tbar."
"Cipher?"
"Not good enough to keep store, I
don't reckon, but as fur as twelve times
twelve I ain't noslouch. 'Tother side
of that is what gits me."
"Where is your homeP"
" I'm from old Shelby."
" What's your father's religious de
nomination ?"
" HimP Oh, he's a blacksmith."
''No. no—l don't mean his trade.
What's his religions denomination?"
"Oh—l didn't understand you befo' ;
He's a Freemason."
" No—no, you don't get my meaning
yet What I mean is, does he belong to
any church?"
"Now you're taikin'. Couldn't
make out what your was trying to git
through yo' head no way. B'jong to a
church! Why boss, he's been the pi
zinest kind of a Freewill Baptis' for
forty years. They ain't no piaeaer
ones'n he is. Mighty good man, pap is.
Everybody says that. If they said any
differunt they wouldn't sad it where I
wus—not much they wouldn't."
" What is your own religion?"
" Well, boss, you've kind o' got me
tbar—and yit you hain't got mm so
mighty much nuther. I think lif a
feller he'ps another when he's in troable,
and don't CUM, and don't do any ansa
things, nor nutb'n' be aint no bnsinaßß
to do, and don't spell the Bavksris ansae
with a little g, be ain't runain'no ranks
—he's about as saift as if be b'longed in
a church."
" But suppose be did spell U with a
little g—what then?"
" Well, if he done It a-purpose, I
reckon ne wouldn't stand no chance—
he oughtn't to have no ohaaee, anyway,
I'm most rotten certain 'boat that."
" What is your name?"
" Ni cod em us Dodge."
" I think maybe you'll do,Nicedeasas.
We'll give you a trial, anyway."
"All right."
" When would you like to beginP"
" Now.''
So, within ten minutes after we had
first glimpsed this nondescript, be wis
one of us, and with bis coat offend hard
at it.
Beyond that end of our establishment
which was furthest from the street was
a deserted garden, pathless, and thickly
grown with the gloomy and rllUnniinii
" jimpson" weed and its ooaiasoa friend
the stately sunflower. In the midst of
this mournffil spot was a decayed and
aged little" frame" house with but one
room, one window and no ceiling—it
bad been a smoke-house a generation
before. Nicodemus was given this
lonely and ghostly den as a bed-cham
-1)01*
The village smartles recognized a
treasure in Nlcodemun, right away—a
butt to play jokes on. It was easy to
see that ho was inconceivably green and
oonflding. George Jones had the glory
of the first joke on him.
He gave him a cigar with a fire-cracker
In it, and winked to the crowd to come;
the thing explodod presently and swept
away the bulk of Nicodemus' eyebrow
and eyelashes. He simply said.
! "I consider them kind of seeg'yars
dangersome," and seemed to suspect
nothing. The next evening Nicodemus
waylaid George and poured a bucket of
ice water over him.
One day, while Nicodemus was in
swimming, Tom McElroy "tied" his
clothes. Nicodemus made a bonfire of
Tom's byway of retaliation.
A third joke was played upon Nico
demus a day or two later—he walked up
the middle aisle of the village church,
Sunday night, with a staring handbill
pinned upon his shoulders. The joker
spent the rest of the night, after ohurcb,
in the cellar of a deserted house, and
Nicodemus sat on the cellar door till
toward breakfast time, to make sure
that the prisoner remembered that if any
noise was made some rough treatment
would be the consequence. Tbe cellar
had two feet of stagnant water in it, and (
was bottomed with six inches of soft
mad.
But I wander from the point. It was
the subject of skeletons that brought
this boy back to my recollection. Be
fore a long time had elapsed the village
smarties began to feel an uncomfortable
consciousness of not having made a very
shining success out of their attempts on
the simpleton of "Old Shelby." Experi
ments grew scarce and chary. Now tho
young doctor came to tbe rescue. There
was delight and applause when he pro
posed to them the plan of frightening
Nicodemus to death, and explained how
he was going to do it. He had a noble
new skeleton—the skeleton of the late
and only local [celebrity, Jimmy Finn,
the village drunkard—a grisly piece of
property he had bought of Jimmy Finn
himself, at auction, for fifty dollars, un
der great competition, when Jimmy lay
very sick in the tan-yard a fortnight be
fore his death. The fifty dollars had
gone promptly for whisky, and had con
siderably hurried up the change of own
ership in the skeleton. The doctor
would pat Jimmy Finn's skeleton in
Nicodemus' bed.
This was (lone —about half-past ten in
the evening. About Nicodemus' usual
bedtime— midnight—the village jokers
came creeping stealthily through the
jimpsop weeds and sunflowers toward
the lonely frame den. They reached
the window and peeped in. There sat
the long-legged pauper on bis bed in a
very short shirt and nothing more. He
was dangling his legs contentedly back
and forth, and wheezing the music of
" Camptown Races" out of a paper
overlaid comb which he was preMing
against his mouth; by him lay a new
jew's-liarp, a new top, a solid india rub
ber ball, a handful of painted marbles,
five pounds of "store" candy and a
well-gnawed slab of gingerbread as big
and thick as a volume of sheet music.
He had sold tbe skeleton to a traveling
quack for three dollars, and was enjoy
ing the result.— From Mark Ttrain" t New
Book, "A Tramp Abroad."
Noser Won't I o It.
Money can secure so much, and gives
in many directions such freedom to the
wili and so much concrete reality to the
fancy, that the man who possesses it
frets when he perceives that bis power
will in other directions do so little. He
feels like a potentate who is stopped by
some object quite trifling, bat quite im
movable; or a magician whose genius
does not obey him except to secure ends
which he is just then seeking to obtain.
Money, for example, will purchase
alleviations from pain, skilled attend
ance, good advice and soft beds, but it
will not purchase the dismissal of tbe
pain itself. If you have a cancer, mil
boos are no help. A millionaire may
have a toothache, and in toothache feels,
on account of tbe money, which places
all dentists at his command, an addi
tional pang.
" Here am I, who can buy all the help
there is, and of what use is that to my
pnin?"
The sense that the money will aid
volition in so many ways deepens into
pain, when it is of the kind in which
money is powerless, as it is in almost all
serious questions of health. The Mar
quis of Steyne is not tbe less aggrieved
bqr his liability to madness because he is
so very rich, bnt the more aggrieved, as
a man who knows b'.s own strength to
be unusual and finds it just insufficient.
That habitual comprint of the rich,
that money will not buy affection or hap
piness, or evffl immunity from pain, has
in it something ot irritation as well as of
pathos, and often from an inclination to
eon tend, as of one who is unjustly de
prived of something.
The workers have need to be solici
tous about health, but it is the rich who
coddle themselves; and the reason is
not so much tbe passion for comfort, as
tbe additional sense of the value of
health, which their inability to buy with
money brings horns to them more
dearly than to other men. A rich man
who wanted water, say in a shipwreck,
and could not get it, would feel
riches, if be thought of them at all, an
addition to tbe pain of bis despair; and
there are wants nearly as urgent as
water toward which money gives just
as little ai' 4 .
Punctuality.
Somo one defines punctuality to be
" fifteen minutes before the time." At
any rate, it is not onq minute after the
time.'
I must tell you an anecdote of the first
Marquis of Abercorn. He invited a
number of friends to dinner. The hour
for dinner was five, and all those invited
knew it, of course. Well, the hour ar
rived and but one of the guests had
come. Down sat the marquis and this
one guest to table. The marquis was
punctual, if only one of the others was.
By-and-bye another guest drorped in,
and was very much mortified to find
dinner being eaten. And one by one all
the rest came, and were likewise morti
fied. But the marquis had taught them
all a good lesson, and I venture to say
that the next time they were invited
none of them got in to the coffee only,
but were on hand for soup.
General Washington was so very
punctual that, on one occasion, some
friends who were expecting him at a
certain hour, on finding that he had not
arrived, all concluded that their watches
must have got wrong; and sure enough
they had. for Washington soon came,
and was not a minute late. No doubt
his habits of punctuality helped to make
him the great man that be was.
I knew a clergyman once throw him.
self into the Mississippi river and swim
eighteen miles down stream to keep an
appointment for afternoon service. I
traveled through the Upper Mississippi
, .region shortly after, and for hundreds of
miles from the place where he lived, out
toward the border, I heard of his great
feat. The border men respected such a
man, and called him " the minister who
made the big swim."
Nor is any one too young to begin the
cultivation of habits of punctuality.
The boy who is on time at school, on
time in class, on time when sent on an
errand, and so on, is apt to be the punc
tual business or professional man. The
habit of promptness is likely to cling all
through life.
Some persons, on the contrary, go all
through life in a slip-shod, down-at-the
heel way, and never prosper. They get
to a wedding as pecple are coming off.
They are late at church; don't meet
their notes, go to protest, and ore in
trouble generally.
Washington's way was the best. The
Marquis of Abercorn was in the right.
That Mississippi clergyman did nobly.
And these three are good examples for
our boys and girls to follow. Never be
behind time, and if you can be a little
ahead of it, and you will never repent
of the habit of punctuality.— Golden
Days.
An "anxious inquirer" writes too
know if we can advise a young man to
" settle in the West." Yes, we can; but
we first advise him to settle at home (if
he has anything to settle) and his friends
will not bate to part with him so bad.—
Middletoum Transcript.
A bare Mosqaito Killer.
The Pyre thrum roseum, or " Persian
chamomile." is the powdered leaf of a
harmless flower growing in Caucasian
Asia in great profusion, where for cen* I
turies it has been used to rid the natives
of unwehome guests from the insect
world. It can be purchased at almost
any reliable druggist at about seventy
cents per pound, all ready prepared for
use.
With a finely powdered dust made
from these flowers, the mosquito, the
house fly, the wicked flea, and the dis
gusting cimex lectudarius may all be
put to flight or murdered. It is only
necessary to heap up into a little oone
one teaspoonful of the drug pyrethrum,
touch it with a lighted match, and
watch the thin blue line of smoke as it
rises to the ceiling and is wafted through
the air, changing the busy drone of in
sect life into a weak wail of insect woe.
Pretty soon down they come plump on
to the table and over your paper, pins
on their tiny backs, and then sheath
their lancets, curl up their hair-like
legs, and are no more.
Smoke from the Persian chamomile
or Rs dusty powder, is most efficacious,
but the purity of the drug must be as
sured. It must have a bright buff color,
be light, readily bumed, and give a
pleasant tea-like 'fragrance; one pinch
should kill a dozen flies, confined in a
bottle, atonoe; where it fails of these
properties it has been adulterated.
In common use in large or breezy
rooms, where from great dilution it fails
to kill, it nevertheless produces on in
sect life. through its volatilised essential
oil or resin, undoubted nausea, vertigo,
respiratory spasm, and paralysis. It
acts upon them through the minute
eptraoles, the breathing tubes, that stud
the surfaces of their little bodies, and
form the delicate network ot veins in
their tiny wings. To human beings it
is entirely innoxious and not disagree
able.—Z7arpcr\i/?arrtr\
The (let-Up Bedstead.
At the Panoptikon of Dresden there is
on exhibition a curious piece of mech
anism, entitled "Get Up." Over a bed
is a dial, the index of which is set over
night to the hour at whioh the sleeper
wishes to arise in the morning, which,
when it reaches the bed, as a mild pre
liminary to more decisive action, lights
a powerful lamp, so placed as to cast its
ravs directly on the sluggard. Should
this gentle hint Ml, five minutes alter
the bed automatically fall* asunder,
causing the sleepy occupant to lapse to
tin floor with a foice and suddenness
that prove fatal to dumber.
It is the tiny streamlet which is kept
In-n splutter, by a stick tbrust into in
waters by a willful boy.
The Worklngman In Pertagal.
In the most civilized countries ol
tourist-haunted Europe, the beggar and
the professional showman are prominent
figures in the landscapes. In Italy the
mendicants swarm in every gorge, re
placing the banditti who have been
bunted down by the bersaglieri. In
Switzerland they beset you at each pass
and col, whining at your heels as you
enter the villages and leave them. Even
in Germany, where begging is strongly
forbidden, they make silent appeals
while the carriage changes horses, and
limp nimbly along at the side of the
forewheel, where they have you at an
advantage when pulling up a steep. In
the rural districts of Portugal there is
no nuisance ol the kind. There is an ex
cellent Byßtem of voluntary relief. The
country is decidedly underpopulated,
and the peasants, for the most part, are
well-to-do. In some provinces they are
worse off than in others; but everwhere
tbey are well fed nnd comfortably
clothed; while in the more fertile and
populous parts of the north they may be
said to bo relatively rich. It is not un
usual to see a laborer's wife wearing
gold ornaments on her person on Sunday
of the value of from twenty-five to one
hundred dollars. And the good man
himself has bis gay festa clothing, with
buttons of silver on glossy velveteen,
and rejoices in the dandyism of a spot
less white shirt front, lighted up by a
gold stud in the central frill. He works
hard, to be sure; sometimes hfo toil, in
the long days of midsummer, will extend
to sixteen hours; but then he lives un
commonly well. He can even afford to
be something of an epicure, and he re
joices in a variety ol diet that laborers
might well envy. His bill of fare In
cludes beef and bacon, dried codfish—
which is the common delicacy o( all
classes—lard, bread and rice, olives and
olive oil, with a luxurious profusion of
succulent vegetables. He is allowed
gourds and cabages at discretion, nor
can anything be more suitable to a sul
try climate. And, like the Frenchman
and his nearer neighbor, the Spaniard,
he is always something of a cook. Not
that he has studied refinements of cui
sine; but he can dress the simple ingre
dients of his banquets in a fashion that
is inimitable so far n it goes. The be
lated wayfarer who is asked to sit down
to the stew that has been slowly aim
mci ing in the pipkin over the embers
it is, in fact, the Spanish olla podrida—
//as, assuredly, no cause to complain.—
arptr's Weekly.
Later Effects of Sanstroke.
Many persons are killed every year by
improper exposure to the heat of the
sun. We are all familiar with this sad
fact. But it is not so well known that
those who apparently fully recover from
a sunstroke, are liable to future ailments,
as a consequence of the attack.
The inflammation of t be ner7e-cenU i s,
caused by the beat, generally results in
permanent changes of their structure or
ot their substance. l>cnce, however
well the person may be eveq for years
these tissue changes may. at a later
period, give rise to impaired health and
even to death.
| But what is still Worse, is that the
moat frequent consequence is insanity;
an insanity, too. of the more violent
type, occasioned by an acute inflamma
| tion of the membranes of the brain.
The inflammation directly affects the
gray matter of the cerebral convolu
sions, on which intelligence depends.
This is a calamity worse than to have
been stricken dead at once.
We would not unnecessarily alarm
any person wbo bas suffered from coup
de soleil. But we would impress on
such persons the need of taking great
care of their health; the necessity of
avoiding whatever lowers its tones
especially all ex cos and passion, and
whatever tends to disturb the cerebral
functions.
Wo would also let the lacts empha
sise the need of guarding against an ex
posure to attack. Parents should teach
their children the dangers of undue ex
posure to the sun's heat. We would
also remind those who indulge in alco
holic drinks, that tbey are specially
liable to sunstroke; and that persons
who use such drinks seldom recover
when they have been attacked by this
serious disorder. — Youth's Companion.
Fslr Play Is • Jewel.
Our readers are doabtless familiar
with the anecdote which tells of the
heroic self-denial of Sir Philip Sidney,
as he lay bleeding on the field of Zut
pben. His attendants had procured a
bottle of wine. Just as the bleeding
knight was tasting it he saw a wounded
soldier carried by, who cast a longing
look on the wiue. "My poor fellow, thy
necessity is greater tnsn mine," said
Sidney, on he ordered the bottle to be
given him.
Bravo men havo not infrequently ex
hibited a similar self-denying spirit. The
lato Admiral Farragut records in his
journal one such display. It occurred
in one of the naval battles of the war of
1819, when the Essex was attacked by
two British ships or war.
Lieutenant Cowoll, of the Essex,being
badly wounded in the leg, was carried
into the cockpit, where the surgeons
had their bands Axil. Seeing him, one
of the doctors dropped another patient,
and proposed to amputate (ho leg forth
with.
" No, doctor, none of that, "answered
the gallant officer; "fair play is a
jewel. One man's life is ss dear as an
other. I won't cheat any poor follow
out of bis turn."
When his turn came, on hour or two
aforr, it was too late. The amputation
was performed, but the patient was too
weak to survive It.
Pitch Pine.
From Wilmington, N. C., southward
and nearly all the way to Florida, the
pitch-pine trees, with their blazed sides,
attract the attention of the traveler.
The land for long stretches arc almost
worthless, and the only industry, beyond
small patches of corn or cotton, is the
" boxing" of the pitch-pine trees for the
gum, as it is called, and the manufacture
of turpentine and resin. There are sev
eral kicds of pine trees, including the
white, spruce, yellow, lioumany and
pitch pine. The latter is the only valu
able one for boxing, and differs a lit
tle from the yellow pine, with which it
is sometimes confounded at the North.
The owners of these pine lands generally
lease the privilege for the business, and
receive about $125 for a crop, which
consists of 10,000 boxes. The boxes are
cavities cut into the tree near the ground
in such away as to hold about a quart,
and from one to tour boxes are cut in
each tree, the number depending on its
size. One man can attend to and gather
the crop of 10,000 boxes during the sea
son, which lasts from March to Septem
ber. About three quarts of the pitch or
gum is the average production of each
box, but to secure this amount the bark
of the tree above must be backed away
a little every fortnight. Doing this so
often, and for successive seasons, re
moves the bark as high as can be easily
reached, while the quantity of the gum
constantly decreases, in that it yields
less spirit, as the turpentine is called,
And then the trees are abandoned. The
gum is scraped out of the boxes with a
sort of wooden spoon, and at the close of
the season, after the pitch on the ex
posed surface of the tree has become
bard, it is removed by scraping, and is
only fit for resin, producing no spirit.
, The gum sells for $1.50 a barrel to the
distillers. From sixteen barrels of the
crude gum, which is about the average
quantity of the stills, eighty gallons of
turpentine and ten barrels of resia are
made. The resin sells for from $1.40
to $5 per barrel, according to quality,
and just about pays for cost of gum and
distilling, leaving the spirit, which sells
for forty cents a gallon, as the profit of
the business. Immense quantities of
resin await shipment along the line, and
the pleasant odor enters the car win
dows as we are vgliirled along. After
the trees are unfit for further boxing,
and are not suitable for lumber, tbey
are sometimes used to manufacture tar,
but the business is not very profitable,
and is only done by large companies,
wbo can thus utilize their surplus labor.
The trees are cut up into wood, which is
piled into a hole in the ground and cov
ered with (arth, and then burned, the
' same as charcoal is burned in New York.
The heat sweats out the gum, which,
uniting with the smoke, runs off through
a spout provided for that purpose. A
cord of wood will make two barrels of
tar, which sells for $1.50 a barrel, and
, costs thirty-seven and a half cents to
make. The charcoal is then sold for
cooking purposes.
Fifteen Years or Life a Blank.
In a plain but neat little story-and-a
half white house, in Syracuse, N. Y.,
says a letter from that city, lives a Ger
man girl named Amelia Hosch, who
passed her twenty-sixth birthday on
i the fifteenth of January last. The
greater part of her life—folly fifteen
years—has been a blank. In her child-
hood Amelia was considered an unusu
ally bright girl. She early learned to
read and write both English and tier
man, and could play the piano with
considerable skill. When between ten
. and eleven years of age she was attacked
with fever and ague. This soon de
veloped into hysterical fits, and in a
few weeks the girl lost her teason.
Her power of speech left her, and her
limbs refused to support her. Bbe be
came a helpless Imbecile, and did not
leave her bed except when lifted from
it. From four to eight times a night
and from two to six times a dav she
was seised with the most violent parox
ysms. Many times it was thought that
she was drawing her last breath. Medi
cines ot every kind were tried, but
without effect. In March. 1879, Dr. A.
H. Tankie visited the girl and made a
diagnosis of her case. He combined a
preparation of his own with (me ob
tained from a professor in Columbia
oollege. New York. The second night
after Amelia began taking the prepara
tion she slept all night, something she
had nqt done before in fifteen yean.
She began to inorease in flesh, and in
Jane uttered the fint words that she
had spoken since she was first attacked.
Gradually her powers of speech re
turned, and with it her memory. The
period of her mental slumber is a blank
andshe is more of a child than a woman,
except in yean. She tells of what she
saw in her childhood and sings the
songs that she used to sing in her Sun
day school. Although she has received
no instruction since her reoovery, she
ca*i ead, write, figure, and do every
thing that she did before she lost her
reason. When asked about her Illness
she looks at the questioner In • won
dering way—she knows nothing about
it. She now weighs about 140 pounds
—nearly twice as much as she did be
fore she began taking the preparation.
She is a strong, healthy looking young
woman. She articulates rather slowly,
but her replies are prompt and oorrect.
While talking with the correspondent
she said: " I know everything I used to
know." She likes to talk, and em
braces every opportunity to converse
that U offered. The cgse excites the
wonder of physicians, and a great many
have called to see the girl.
The Breaker* Broken.
Onward, onward, sever higher!
Upward, npward, never higher!
Ah! waves, Ah! men, ahell brave endeavor
Kail beqk in froth and loam forever T
Yet mark thoee eager create that hover,
Uke bird*, the moving wave-man* over;
The wave* roll beck, bat they >lath on,
The dry aaad drinka them; one by one
They perish on the beech forlorn.
Aa they die, a thought emerge*
Gbout-like from the shattered surges;
"To strive is still to fail; the strongest
In striving meet bat sailer longest."
Far sweeter than raad sarface-motion
The dim green depths of unstirred ocean'
More happy than the windy crest
A lowly liie where love and rest
House in the chambers of the breast.
TKomat H. Price
ITEMS OF IMEBEST.
A capital thing—Cash.
Stakeholders —Butchers.
Itifle clubs—Gangs of pickpockets.
The census shows that New Jersey Las
30,000 fanners.
Grasshoppers have devastated the
crops in man; Kentucky counties.
Unprofitable employment—Laboring
under a mistake.— Meruicn Recorder.
The yoke of some fashionable suits is
of a material differing from that of the
waist.
The first steam engine on this conti
nent was brought from England in
1753.
Gin Sling is the name of a Chinese stu
dent who has entered the freshman class
at Yale college.
It is said the United States army uses
up about half a million pounds of to
bacco every year.
Gold fish were first brought from
China to England in 1691, and were then
a great curiosity.
A French statistician says there are
8,000 persons in Paris who spend 910,000
a year and upward.
It takes a whole legislature to change
a man's name. A woman can change
tier's by the act of a single man.
In the prisons of the State of New
York there are 8,000 convicts employed
at stove molding and hollow ware.
The Somerviile Journal makes it out
that the eagle is the aristocrat of birds,
because tie moves in the highest circles
When the phonetic spelling comes
into us it will always be rite in order to
rite rite, to rite rite, rile—Andrews
Queen.
On seeing a house being white-washed,
a small boy of three asked : "Man, if
you please, arc you shaving that
house.
" Never mistake perspiration for in
spiration," said an old minister in his
charge to a young pastor just being
ordained.
The way the king of the Snndwic L
islands carves a chicken is to take hold
of both legs, draw a long breath, and
pull for all he is worth.
An unoorked phial of oil of penny
royal left on the ledge of the window or
on a table at the head of the bed will
drive away mosquitoes.
" Did you catch anything on Sunday,
when you went fishing, Johnnie?"
" Nothing," said Johnnie, "till I go
home, and then mnybe I didn't."
The crow rarely opens its mouth
without caws. It would be a great
blessing If this example were univer
sally followed.—FonJUrj Statesman.
The vailey of the Mississippi has
1,857,000 square miles of territory. Its
waters make about 10,000 miles of navi
gation, and its valleys give level routes
to a vast system of railways.
A good cow ought to produce 8,000
pounds of milk annually; but in this
country the average is oaly about half
that, while in Holland 10,000 pounds is
only considered a lair yield.
According to statistics collected by
the Insurance Chronicle, 9353,018,855
worth of property has been destroyed
by fire in the United States during the
last five years.
Texas commenced raising wool in
1845, and has now 4,000,000 sheep.
It is estimated that Montana will pro
duce this year 80,000,000 pounds of wool,
nearly as much as California.
The reason more umbrellas than
watermelons are stolen, is thought to be
because the thief doesnt have to plug
the umbrella. It is always ripe for the
harvest.— Fond du Lac Rssnrtsr.
There are many unpleasant things in
this vale of tears, but a collar with a
button-hole large enough to stick your
bead through will cause you about as
much trouble as the rest of thsm.
Borne mean fellow has said that when
one talks to women he must cboo-r be
tween lying or displeasing them, and
that the only middle oouree is to bold
one's tongue.- -Somerviile Journal.
" Why dont you get married?" said
a young lady to a bachelor acquaintance
who wae on a visit. " I have oeen try
ing for the last te* years to find some
one who would be silly enough to take
me, and have not yet succeeded," was
the reply. "Then you haven't been
own our way," was the insinuating
rejoinder.
Rev. Mr. Clongh, of the American
Baptist mission to the Teloogoos. South
India, eaye in the Missionary Magasxn :
In five different I tarn lets the idols were
all given up to me; two of these we htd
been trying to get for eome years The
whole number of idols given up was
about 100, and aU but twenty were
shapeless stones.
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