J
UIMU uummumi tiuMuu i am
But she has malice toward her kind -
A cruel tongue and a jealous mind.
Void of pity, aud full of greed.
She judgee the world by her narrow creed.
A brewer of quarrels, a breeder of hate.
Yet she holds the key to "society's" gate.
The other woman, with a heart of flame,
% Went mad for a love that marred her name.
And out of the grave of her murdered faith
She rose like a soul that has passed thro' death
Her aim is noble, her pity so broad
It covers the world tike the mercy of God.
A healer of discord, a soother of woes,
Peace follows her footsteps wherever she goes,
The worthier life of the two, no doubt;
And "society" locks hor out.
—Ella Wheeler Wllco*.
ALFRED'S PIPE.
( Gran'iua Hubbeli did not like tobacco
smoke. Throughout the many years ol
her wedded life she had tried hard to
learn to like the odor of it, but had fail
ed. Ilpr husband, however, supposed
that she was fond of it. Men are clumsy
about such things. They do not feel oul
the truth as women do. They trust tc
their senses and their reason, and there
fore women ciieat them.
"It is the dear man's only fault,"
Charlotte Hubbeli had said to herseli
when she was a young wife, "and he
shall never know that I dislike it."
. For more than forty years she had
lovingly deceived him. After supper
she would bring his slippers and his
pipe; and he, stupid lover, would pufl
aud toast his feet and say and feel:
"Here is peace that passeth under
standing."
Then lie would look up into the lightly
curling smoke and try to think how
miserable lie should be if he had found
a wifo whose tastes were not thus suited
to his own. And he would lay her head
upon his shoulder and kis3 hor; and that
was all she wished. It told her he was
happy in her love.
Once, in the street, she passed a man
and faintly caught the odor of his freshly
lighted cigar. She rather liked it.
"If Alfred would smoke cigars!" she
thought.
Slyly she laid away spare money uutil
she had enough. Then one day she called
the judgment of a friend into service, and
that evening she brought thgftippcrs and
a box of choice cigars.
Her husband took her in his arms aud
blessed her for her thoughtfulness
"Always thinking of my pleasure," he
said. "But, sweetheart, you should have
purchased something for yourself in
stead. The pipe is good enough for me.'
"Nothing but the best is good enough
for you," she said, honestly and proudly.
She had really forgotten that she had
bought the cigars for herself.
"You precious woman!" he replied,
still holding her in his arms, and ther*
in sweet, deep silence they drank the
joy that blesses only such immortal
souls as merge thus, two in one.
"But, my darling," he at length contin
ued, "I am not going to smoke these
cigars. They are too choice, t<x> exjiou
sive. I cannot afford such luxuri"-.. Wo
will keep tlieni for special <v *<oua,
when our friends come to sv ii- The
old pipe is good enough for mo
He thought he had said it ••!; awk
ward man. And she let him co.itiuue to
' think so, tactful woman, ilut she knew
he liked the pipe better.
Alfred Hublieil was not the kind of
man to become wealthy. Ho had not
an extravagant habit, unless iudulgenoe
of a generous nature be extravagance.
He was a furrier with a well established
trade, but lie was honest and charitable,
and these two qualities are seldom
united with that other quality which
piles up fortunes. Yet he was coo ton I
and his wife was content, and ;. Iter all
contentment is the only real wn.Mi
"My pipe is the only hixnrv . •• .J,"
he said.
"His pipe is his only vice," sr.id a.is.
When he had his smoke in the evening
he always laid his pipe upon the little
lampstand near his easy chair. The next
morning Mrs. Hubbeli put it out of sight
Sometimes it made her almost sick to
handle it, for, like all true lovers of the
pipe, ho clung to one until it was so
saturated with tobacco oil its odor was
unspeakable.
The children of the neighborhood had
learned to love her and call her"gran'ma."
In the years long gone she had borne and
nursed two babes, but they had died
upon iier breast. Let no man try to tell
what this must mean. The language ol j
imagination fails. Experience alone can
know the thrill of motherhood, the
purifying sorrow of its loss. She was
everybody's gran'ma now that she wat
and ever must be nobody's.
When the financial panic swept like a
blight over the country the furriers were
among the first to feel its damning
breath. When economy becomes neces
sary to men accustomed to the luxuries
they buy more wine, they go oftener to
the theatre, they get faster and costliex
horses; these are the diverting influences
that keep their minds turned from theit
troubles. But it is the women who sup
port the furriers, and women suffer losses
in another way—a harder and a braver
way. Man runs away from sorrow;
women faces it and bears it He flees
and frightens it with laughter; she stays
and welcomes it with tears. He spends;
she saves.
Mr. Hubbeli now passed bis evenings
down town. The presence of the men
he met inspired him with the courage he
felt he soon should need, for men are
<\ brave only in groups. Pride is the brav
ery of man.
, When the sheriff put his padlock on
the Hubbeli store the proprietor felt
better, more at ease. The worst had
come. The agony of expectation, at
least, was at an end. Then, too, he had
been providing against this situation,
and had engaged provisionally with a
wealthy eastern house to go to Hudson
Bay and spend the winter buying furs
for it. Gran'ma, too, had been prepared
for this. She had wept in secret over
the dread prospect, and bravely smiled
when he was near. It was their first
parting.
"And he so old and feeble and accus-
pipe more vigorously than ever before
since the night prior to the birth of their
first little one. He tried to hide behind
the bank of smoke that trouble might
not find him. Gran'ma slowly rocked
back and forth in her little low chair,
her hand in his upon her lap. Both had
a single thought. Neither spoke.
At last he )'id the pipe upon the stand,
and soon the house was dark.
#•
Gran'tna's kiudly eyes were red with
weeping. She sat alone. She had never
felt so much alone before.
She arose to put the house in order.
She put out her hand to take the pipe, the
old black pipe, from the stand where
he had laid it. Then she stopped and
brushed her eyes, and went about the
other work. More than once she started
to remove the pipe, but 6topped and said:
"Not yet."
Neighbors came in to. cheer iter up.
All sniffed the pipe and made her sad.
One of them said:
"What is that I smell?"
Gran'ma answered: "It is Alfred's pipe.
It is dreadful; but I—l can't take it away
) —not now."
"Nor I wouldn't," said the woman
tenderly.
"I will after a while," said gran'ma,
the tears coming to her eyes again.
When a week had gone by the pipe
still lay upon the stand. A neighbor's
child came in.
"Gran'ma. why don't you throw that
nasty old pipe outdoors?"
"I can't, my child."
"I can," and the child reached for it.
Gran'ma grasped the little arm so sud
denly, almost roughly, that the child
began to cry
"Don't touch it—don't ever touch it,"
said gran'ma, with something like se
verity, and then she knelt and pressed
the frightened child close to her breast
and smoothed it with her tender kisses.
Poor gran'ma's eyes were red most of
the time now. The passing days did not
seem to take her grief away with them.
The pipe was in its now accustomed
place, and gran'ma cautioned everybody
not to touch it. She talked so much
abont it and was so eurneet in her warn
ings that the people in the neighborhood
looked sorrowful and tapped their tem
ples with their finger tips and shook
their heads. The children went still
further. They told goblin stories about
die old black pipe, and one of theui de
clared that she had seen a pair of fiery
eyes down in the bowl and heard a groan.
In a few weeas uobody but the post
man made calls on gran'ma. One day
at last he also ceased to come. Poor
gran'ma sat and watched and waited,
but'he passed the house and went upon
his way. Then for hours the dry eyed
woman sat and gazed upon the dear old
pipe and felt that it was all of life for
her. Could she but have wept! But
grief had dried the fountains of her
heart.
" Why did 1 let him go front me? Why
did I let him go?" she moaned.
One night site thought site heard a tap
upon the door. Iler heart stood still.
"They've brought his body home," she
thought.
The blood rushed aud hounded through
her head. She heard only its heavy
sound She swooned and sank from her
chair.
W hen she regained her consciousness
site looked first to see that the pipe was
undisturbed, then hurried to the door.
Ail was dark and dreary. No one was
there. She went to bed, and nature
kindly sent her off to sleep.
Some time in the night she awoke
with a great indefinable joy in her heart.
What was it? A presentiment of some
impending happiness? She seemed to
breathe it from the very air. It touched
her senses from afar and penetrated to
her very soul. What could it be? It
seemed to come with greater and still
greater force. It was—yes, now she
knew—it was tobacco smoke. And then
her husband softly opened the chamber
door and she saw him standing there,
the old black pipe between his lips and
curls of smoke above his head.
"You did not get my telegram?" he
asked when they had wept and laughed
together on eacli other's breast.
"No. When?"
"Why, yesterday."
It was the messenger who brought the
gladsome newß whom she had heard the
evening before.—Washington Post.
The Alligators' Nest.
Alligators' nests resemble hay cocks
more than anything else to which they
can be compared. They average about
four feet in height and about five feet in
diameter and are constructed of grasses
and herbage. First the mother 'gator
deposits one layer of eggs on a floor of
mortar, and having covered this with a
stratum of mud and herbage about eight
inches thick, lays another set of eggs
upon that, and so on to the top, there
being commonly from 100 to 200 eggs in
a nest. With their tails they then beat
down the tall grass and weeds, to pre
vent the approach of unseen enemies.
The female watches ler eggs until they
are hatched by the heat of the sun, and
then takes ler brood under her own
care, defending them and providing for
their subsistence. Dr. Lutzemburg, of
New Orleans, once packed one of these
nests for shipment to St. Petersburg, but
they 1 latched out before they were start
ed on the long voyage, and were kept
about the doctor's premises, running all
over the hcxise, up and down stairs,
whining like young puppies.—St. Louis
Republic.
Flavoring Eggs.
It is not generally known tliat eggs
can be easily flavored to suit the taste.
They at once absorb any fragrance or
odor with which they are placed in con
tact, and by storing the eggs in a basket
lined with roses or violets they will short
ly be found to have acquired the flavor
of the flowers; and by packing them in
barrels of straw they soon acquire the
flavor of the straw, as is well known.—
New York Commercial Advertiser.
... . - - —mi ,mw ■ ■■ -rmr
An Ancient Art In Which the liritone and
Romans Were Adepts —The Process as It
Is Carried on In u modern Shop—Not a
Very Lucrative Calling.
Wicker work is world wide and of an
cient date. The Romans found wicker
boats covered with skins in use among
the ancient natives of Britain. Round
boats of wicker work, covered with bitu
men or skins, were used on the Tigris
and Euphrates in the time of Herodotus,
and similar boats are still used there. In
India boats of a similar form and con
struction are Btill in use for crossing
rapid rivers; they are made of bamboo
and skins and require only a few hours'
labor.
The ancient Britons manufactured
wicker vessels with extraordinary skill
and ingenuity. Their costly and elegant
baskets are mentioned by Juvenal in
speaking of the extravagance of the
Romans in his time. The natives of
South America made baskets of rushes
so closely woven as to hold liquids. The
natives of Tasmania wove similar water
tight vessels of leaves.
The Kaffers and Hottentots are skilled
inweaving the roots of certain plants.
Shiel 1... in ancient times, were con
structed of wicker work, plain or cov
ered !i hides, and are still in use
anio<-. . tain savage tribes. Wicker
wo; , i.-i now largely used for the bodies
of light carriages. In different parts of
the world, houses, huts, gates, fences,
sledges and shoes are formed by this
ancient and universal art.
In the construction of the rudest kind
of a basket the twigs or rods are assorted
according to their size and use and left
considerably longer than tho work to be
woven. Thov are laid on tho floor in
pairs parallel to oach other and at small
intervals apart and in tho direction of
the lua de.meter of the basket. Two
large r • are laid across tho parallel
rods i.an i.ioir thick ends toward the
workman, w ho is to put his foot on thein
and VV:M'. ~ IHEM ouo at a time alter
nately el.'! and under those first laid
down, c.nd'inng them in their places.
This form <; he foundation of tho baskol
and is lee ...i-ally called the slat or slate.
Then the ion;; end of oue of these twe
rods is woven over and under the pain
of short ends all round the bottom til.
the whole is woven in. The same it
done with tlieother rod, and then addi
tional long ones are woven in till tin
bottom of the basket is of sufficient size,
lite sitles are formed by sharpening tin
large ends of enough stout rods to form
the rils.. an I plaiting or forcing thi
shai|M>ii "i " tls into the bottom of thi
baskc. t !•■••.i the circumference towari
tho co; i, i. i en raising the rods in tlu
direction i:i sides of the basket are tj
have eii.l weaving other rods lietweot
them lid the liasket is of the requirsd
dep.i. I" a brim is formed by bending
down .> ' fastening the perpendieulat
Bid; .* • ribs, whereby the whole it
firm 1 iiipactly united. A handle
is lit: iiasket by forcing two or
three i rods of the right length
dow ~ ,n.tC of the sides close t<
each • . ; pinning them fast about
twoi i' - u-'.uw the brim, so that th
haiidhi. i->tain its position when com
pleted. 'I he ends of the rods are Uvea
bound or plaited in any way the work
men may choose.
There are twelre firms of basket mak
ers in Detroit, employing about 100 per
sons, mostly men and boys. It is seldom
that a girl is employed in this business,
and titers are no women. The reason
assigned is that the only thing tbey
oould GO would be to plat, and there is
so much licnding over in the work.
Besides this the cutting of splints
and I lands is very heavy work. The
men an.l beys work ten hours a day
when thrv do not work by the piece, and
the avenge wages are from $5 to $lO per
week. Piece workers somotimes average
$lB per week, but that is when the bas
ket maker is especially skillful.
The (asket principally manufactured
in the city is the splint, the splints being
shavings cut from Norway pine and in a
large variety of sizes, some covered and
some open, from a quart to a bushel and
a half. Tho largest sized covered baskets
are used extensively by florists in which
to convoy cut flowers, and are packed in
the delivery wagons. Traveling lunch
baskets are made of the Norway splints,
and are used generally for the festive
picnic and for traveling purposes where
a cold luucli is the comfortable and eco
nomical ideu. The splints are woven in
diamond . :pe. and the market baskets
of this mat- rial are called diamond bas
kets.
Other market baskets are made of the
osier willow, the osiers coming from
various parts of Michigan. Of the willow
baskets, there is the clothes hamper, the
clothes basket and open and covered
market baskets varying in size, but all
having a special form.
The willows are prepared by tlie boil
ing process for tire purpose of peeling
them. Tbey are then allowed to cool,
and axe tied up in bundles for future use.
They are split as they are needed for use
by passing them through a small knife,
set in a block. A great many wild wil
lows are used, but only in rough baskets,
such as open market baskets. Cultivated
willows are used for the finer qualities of
baskets and willow chairs and cradles,
and the tops of children's carriages. The
willows are grown in swampy places that
cannot be utilized for other purposes
without draining.
Tho fancy baskets are principally im
ported from Germany. TJhe gaudily
stained Indian basket is made on Wal
poie island, but there is not near so many
made on that island as heretofore. The
wood, principally black ash and latterly
rock elm, has been exhausted, and they
have got to get their material in Canada.
Mostly market baskets are made by the
Indians.
The general condition of those who are
engaged in the manufacture of baskets
and wicker work generally is one of fair
living, with close economy, since the
business is one which is not of a nature
to develop great establishments and con
centrate great wealth.—Detroit News.
editor,who deaired to publish a complete
list of ladies who would receive New
Year's calls, arrayed a dozen or twenty
reporters in immaculate dress suits, put
them in carriages and started them
around to investigate. There was an un-
THE BOYS IN SWALLOW TAILS,
certain feeling among some, who were
not used to the costume, as they rolled
up to stone front houses in luxurious
coaches—a nervousness at the scantiness
of their coat tails, their vast white shirt
fronts, their ministerial ties. But the
scheme panned out well in results, and
the ingenious editor, who had pressed
into the service many a novice in social
customs, spread page after page of very
choice news before his readers.
There is nothing that a newspaper
man can stop at in order to get informa
tion. When Commodore Vanderbilt lay
on hi 3 dentil bed the city dailies kept re
lays of reporters in a room convenient to
the house, and every moment of the day
and night for many days eaeli paper bad
its eye on the events passing within the
stricken home. It is needless to say that,
the interest of the general public was
just as great as that of the newspaper
men, and the first greeting of the morn
ing and one repealed all day was. "What
is the news about Vanderbilt?"
This was morel; waiting for the ex
pected, and was a ease of slieer patience.
It is the man or woman who refuses to
be interviewed, and places all manner of
guards against the newspaper man, that
gives the trouble. The noted burglar
and murderer, Edward RulofT, after the
discovery of his identity, which proved
him an old and hardened villain, sul
lenly refused to talk to anybody except
the sheriff. RulofV was in jail at Bing
hamton, under trial for murdering a
clerk who had attempted to defend bis
employer's premises from burglary. He
bad a New York history, and was anx
ious to keep it hidden, so lie told the
sheriff that he would refuse to see all
newspaper men. The first real interview
was obtained by a native of the town,
who was a New York newspaper man,
and whom the sheriff introduced under
the pretense of investigating RulofTs
philological system. The burglar-mur
derer was a modern Eugene Aram, and
had a hobby in philology. The key of
all languages, according to his system,
was L, M and R. The moment these
were mentioned he would talk and un
ravel his scheme, and incidentally, in
recalling the wonderful triumphs, as he
oallcd tlieni. of discovery and collation,
lie told enough about himself, at least
about his past, to furnish all the clews
needed for hia complete identity, and
also disclosed his habits and personal
characteristics—points on which lie was
reserved to the point of ugliness.
What Floored Htm.
A good theme for an article is thrift
and its great value in the practical world.
I cannot find a better text that this wise
utterance of the facetious Mr. Wilkins
Micawber to his young friend David
Copperfield: "My other piece of advice,
Copperfield," said Mr. Micawber, "you
know. Annual income twenty pounds,
annual expenditure nineteen, nineteen
six; result, happiness. Annual income
twenty pounds, annual expenditure
twenty pounds, ought and six pence;
result, misery. Tho blossom is blighted,
the leaf withered, the god of day goes
down upon the dreary scene and—and,
in short, you are forever floored, as I
am." Mr. Micawber liad felt the power
of money and the extreme foolishness
of lavishly throwing away time and op
portunities and he posed as a counselor
before young Copperfield.—Detroit Free
Press.
The English Cruiser Blake.
Here is a picture of the new English
cruiser Blake, riding at anchor in Ports
mouth harbor. She is remarkable as
being the heaviest unarmored cruiser in
the world, her only protection being the
steel deck which extends from end to
end of her hull inside and covers all the
vital parts. Speed is to be the Blake's
particular characteristic. She will have
two independent sets of triple expansion
engines, which, under forced draught,
will (or so my lords expect) develop
20,000 horse power and drive her twenty
two knots an hour; and under natural
draught will develop 13,000 horse power
and drive her twenty knots. Her arma
ment will consist of two 0.2-inch 22-ton
guns and ten 6-inch breechloaders, be-
THE BLAKE AT ANCHOK.
side machine guns and torpedo tubes.
Her length is 875 feet, her breadth 65
feet, her draught 37 feet forward and 38
feet aft, and her estimated cost £430,658.
If she does all that her builders expect
she will be cheap at> the money.
within fifty yardß from me a flat, oval
rock, some ten feet across, covered with
bright green moss. In the center of this
mossy couch a 2-year-old buck lay witb
his left side toward me, his head erect,
his large eyes glistening. I instantly
covered him with my rifle. Then the
true sportsman part of my nature came
up and prevented mo from pressing the
trigger. I held the rifle in position and
studied the picture, which was one that
even a Landseer or Vogt could not faith
fully portray—the combination of shades
of the dark evergreens in the background
and the brilliant coloring of the mos3y
carpet that covered the rocks, then the
deer as it lay there a model of symmetry
and alertness.
As my arm began to tire in holding
out the gun, the old Norse feeling took
possession of me. A quick glance
along the sights, a pressure of the trig
ger, then the report and the air was full
of smoke, and the beautiful deer lay on
its side motionless. I approached it and
saw that the bullet had gone true to its
aim and entered the neck near the shoul
der. 1 laid my rifle down, stepped on
the rock and look it by the hind legs to
turn it, so that its head would hang over
the edge of the rock as I bled it. The
next moment I was where—no matter
where. It's nobody's business but my
own—and i..e deer's—where 1 was,
whether recli..ing or erect, head or heels
up. Whew! but talk about a mule's
kicking, no double team of mules could
kick out as that dead deer did. 1 picked
myself up and also picked up my gun
hastily. There lay tiie deer apparently
dead. I cautiously approached it again
and punched its head with my rifle. Not
a move. Then I touched his shoulder,
which caused a slight quivering of the
muscles of the shoulder and forward. I
touched his hindquarters; then hotv his
heels flew out. There it lay without fur
ther motion. I stooped over and [ laced
my hand over its heart and felt it heat,
md came near getting my head kicked
off, which caused that kind of nonsense
to bo summarily stopped.—Forest and
Stream.
A !I*U<llh.N
The negroes living on Craig's Branch,
just south of Tallahassee, Fia., says The
Montgomery (Ala.) Advertiser, are very
much exercised over the appearance of
a ghost in that neighborhood. It is de
scribed as a tall, headless man, dressed
in flowing white robes, and lias been
seen by several of the negroes walking
alongside the branch, as though in
search of some lost object, evidertly his
head.
An aged negro man, who has lived
there many years, says that about sixty
years ago a beautiful young lady, daugh
ter of a wealthy citizen of Tallahassee,
went out one bright Sabliath, accompa
nied by her Newfoundland 'log, for n
walk to Craig's Branch, plucking wild
flowers along the wayside. Just before
reaching the branch her dog, became
very much excited, and tugged and
pulled at her skirts as though atteu ...
ing to make her turn back. She pai ,
attention to his antics for some tinn , -
he finally caught her skirt in hi. teeth
and refused to budge another inch. She
turned and saw her lover coming toward
her. When within several foot of iier
several Indians sprang from cover, firing
I heir guns as they rose, and the young
uiau fell at her feet a corpse. She ran
and reached the city in safety. A party
from Tallahassee went out and lirought
in the body, its head being completely
riddled with buckshot. This old negro
says he has seen the ghost on several oc
casions.
Collapse of FalstafTa Stomach.
This is the way Hackett, the most
uoted of modern Falstaffs, had a had
joke played ou him in an Edinburgh
theatre. On this particular occasion, in
one of his great scenes, Hackett found
that his stomach began to collapse, tie
wore, as all Falstaffs do, an imuien e
paunch, which, in Hackett's case, was
made of a wind bag. It was found that
a stuffed "stomach" in hot weather was
a terrific burden to an actor, and at last
some costumer invented one which fitted
the dress to perfection, but was filled
with air. The wearer blew it up, screw
ed on the top and then it was all right.
One of Hackett's enemies this evening
had pricked a hole in liis false abdomen,
not large enough to make it collapse all
at once, but by degrees, and Hackett
found at the end of one scene that he
was not quite as stout as he was before,
and said to his dressing man; "This is
not all right; I feel a looseness; see if
this screw is not unfastened." Every
thing was apparently in order, and he
went ou again. He continued to decrease
in size, till at last there came a rush of
wind and the stomach disappeared alto
gether, the actor finishing the scene as
best he could and the audience convulsed
with laughter.—Philadelphia Press.
A Wonderful Lily.
One sometimes hears of the wouderful
productiveness of the golden lily—Liliurn
Auratum, Lindley. Some years ago an
instance was recorded of one stalk, un
der cultivation, bearing no less than
thirty-five flowers. This happened at
Pitlour, in Fifeshire, Scotland, in 1886.
The record is quite beaten by a plant in
the garden of a foreign resi ' nt at Ka
ruizawa, which iB now bearing no fewer
than fifty-seven flowers on one stalk.
The stalk itself is six feet high, and
toward the upper end it flattens out, the
buds hanging like keys on a board. The
upper extremity is cleft Room is thus al
lowed for the remarkable luxuriance of
flowering just described. In The Far
East of Sept. 16, 1872, it is stated: This
summer there grew in the garden of Mr.
G. C. Pearson, on the Bluff (No. Ill),
Yokohama, two stems from one bulb.
Oue was a fair specimen of the ordinary,
flowering of tho plant, having eighteen
flowers upon it; but the other, upon a
broad, fiat stem, about an inch and a
half in width, but thin as a lath, had no!
lees than sixty-threo buds, of which
fifty-two were\ in full flower at one
time.—Japas Weekly Mail.
"men's minds, If one oTTEe many en
terprising newspapers of the day was to
inaugurate a competition in which every
man had to give an accurate description
of the kind of woman most prone to fas
cinate him, many readers would, I
j think, be astonished.
Noah Webster's definition of the word
fascination is, "The exercise of a power
ful or irresistible influence on the affec
tions and passions," and lie gives as
secondary explanation, "Unseeu, inex
plicable influence, witchcraft, enchant
ment." In the words "inexplicable in
fluence" the learned doctor seems to
have summed up neatly the whole ques
tion. Who can explain what is fre
quently the case, that of two men of as
nearly as possible the same cast of mind,
the one will And a woman irresistibly
fascinating, while on the other she
might not exert the slightest attractive
influence? Such u problem is as hard to
solve as why the guileless rabbit, instead
of putting his best leg forward and mak
ing a bolt, circles round the snake, which
he knows only too well intends to make
a meal of him.
The wise heathen Aristotle said: "No
man loves but that ho is first delighted
with comeliness and beauty, and beauty
is for the most part the bait which lures
a victim into the meshes of the snare,
but not always." Dr. Webster, too,
seems to imply by his definition that in
the power of fascination, whether exer
cised by man or woman, there lurks a
certain sexual affinity. Yet one of the
most fascinating women of history was
Germainc Necker, afterwards Miue. de
Stael, though contemporaneous record
tells us that she was anything but a
beauty, and that lier dress was not only
hideous, but sinned against every princi
ple of good taste.
Women, however, whose names will
lie handed down to posterity as having
founded noted salons, or having pro
vided the magnetic influence to gather a
brillant coterie of wit and talent, have,
for tliemost part, been beautiful "iteau
ty is the common object of all love, as
jets draw a straw, BO dotli U SUI., inve."
Beauty will ahvavs attract, at a; rate
momentarily: but most men. if li. imd
that a lovely face is but a m.i cover
ing a void cranium, will cease to natter
around the flame. There are, however,
striking exceptions to this rule on rec
ord.
Perhaps the best instance is that <>t the
infatuation of Prince Maurice do Talley
rand, onco Abbe do Perigord and bishop
of Autun, for that lovely blonde, .11 me.
Grant, afterward Mute. Talleyrand. Her
gross stupidity was proverbial, and fur
nished amusement for the salons of
Mme. do Stael and others, which her
husband frequented.
But in the majority of cases something
more is necessary than comeliness of
face to really fascinate men, especially
such men as the "Prince of Diplomats,"
and this something is the instinctive
faculty which enables a woman to adapt
her mind to and enter into the spirit of
her companion for the time being.
Thus, in my own exjierience, 1 have'
seen a learned professor discoursing elo
quently on the scupture of ancient Greeco
to a young lady whose tastes w -re- in
reality centered in dogs and horses. Ilad
he known her true proclivities, he would
have stood aghast at sucli utter barbar
ism; yet such was her genial, sympa
thetic influence on his mind that he pro
nounced her the most charming of her
sex—second only, of course, to his stout
and learned wife. Had the intercourse
been indefinitely prolonged, doubtless
the potency of the spell would have van
ished; for, in reality, there was little or
nothing in common between the two
minds.
The power of fascination inherent in
woman may, however, bo divided into
two kinds. All of us have 6een the old
lady, generally white haired, with kind
ly, pleasant features, on which time has
set no unfriendly mark, who still retains
all her attractiveness. Note how the boys
and girls adore her; they will go to her
and confide their sorrows, their hopes,
their ambitions, even when they would
not breatho a word to their mothers.
The kindly, living interest in a lad's af
fairs by such an one has time and again
first implanted the impulses in his heart
which eventually led him on to an honor
able career. Quickly, almost by stealth,
the good is done by such, and the good
seed sown wliich will ripen in after time
into a rich and abundant crop.
On the other hand, we have most of
us seen, perhaps in real life, certainly on
the Stage, the fascinating adventuress
who, by her enthralling beaute de diable,
enslaves men's souls and leads them (on
the stage) to dare all for her sake. Such
is directly opposed to the sweet old lady
in her old fashioned chair, and these two
form the opposite poles between which
the women who fascinate vary.—Francis-
Trevelyan in Saturday Review.
The First Lightning: Rod.
Everybody believes that Franklin was
the inventor and constructor of the first
lightning rod. In this one particular
everybody is mistaken. The first light
ning catcher was not invented by the
great philosopher, but by a poor monk of
Seuttenberg, Bohemia, who put up the
first lightning rod on the palace of the
curator of Preditz, Moravia, June 15,
1754. The name of the inventive monk
was ProhopDilwisch. The apparatus was
composed of a polo surmounted by an
iron rod, supporting twelve • curved
branches and terminating in as many
metallic boxes filled with iron ore and
inclosed by a wooden box-like cover,
traversed by twenty-seven iron pointed
rods, the bases of which found a resting
place in tire ore box. The entire system
of wires was united to the earth by a
large chain. The enemies oC Diiwisch,
jealous of his success, excited peasants
of the locality against him, and, under
the pretext that his lightning rod was
the causo of the excessive dry weather,
had the rod taken down and the inventor
imprisoned. Years afterwards M. Mel
sen used the multiple pointed rod as an
invention of his own,—St. Louis Re
public,