Illinois News Index

McHenry Plaindealer (McHenry, IL), 30 Jun 1886, p. 6

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f ,? F1V- s V\ „ ^Vfct . - «, J I . J_« , '*.: mm im}&m TUB mOEN BWIWJK. SENSE OF TOUCH. "I** IUbi listen, 'whoso wouM know, Cencomlog the wisdom of King TM MI: fSfeJi-Pekin, -with round it rolled :.WH»>'Oa Wftvo of fti river of gold; ,.ijwy iird its walla with their ninefold twine, AlWTOe bridges that cross them are ninety and "4*4 •* soon as the wind of morning blows, Wjttd tb* gray in the east takes a flock of rose, «ach bridge 'gins the shuffle and Wast Of Btmrirods of hoofs and thousands <>f feet; •wj all day long there is dust and din, t>W the cooly elbow a the mandarin, • *Od gibe is given, and oath and biow-- *$WM thus in the time of King Tee POh> ni» . It grieved the king that it should lie sd| Then oat of his wisdom spoke King Tee Fob. "Build me a hnndredth bridgp, the bes^ Btgher and wider tlian all the rest, , Withp ets of teak, anil ce,iarn rails, .' v"= ; cAnd {riauks of sandal, with silver nail<^-;'#-i1' Gild it and jiaiut it vermilion red, * : And over it place the dragon's head; - And be it proclaimed to high and low » 'That oxer this fortunate arch shall go - Passenger nono that doth not throw Golden toll to the riyer below. . And when the piece of gold is cast Thrice let the trumpets sound a blast, And the mandarin write with respectftlllQQk jThe passenger's name in a silken bookj •_ f< Bo that I, the king, may have in hand -s, , "The list of the wealthiest of my land."1*'? ' Straightway the bridge was bntlded so As bad spoken tho wisdom of King Tee Poh. s§, IHr* I' '?* , And every day from dawn till dark Tliey who watched tho fortunate arch could mark tike a cloud of midges that glow and gleam jThe gold toll cast to the hurry ins stream: iSAnd all day the trumpet sounded loud, 4And thn mandarin of the cuard kowtowed, v~ iAs he wrote the name, with respectful look, jDf thp passengers high in his silken "Asd ali the while grew the renown ; •* |Of the fortunate arch in Pekin town, . tTill of the wealthiest it was told; A ; " '. "He spends his day on the bridge of goto.* ' - J ' Vu» . And when a month and a day were spent . The King Tee Poh for his treasurer sent. • '"Go to tho bridge," said he, "and look • ' , At the list of names in the silken book, <• And of all that are written, small and fjpnst) 'Confiscate to me the estate: : A8 the sage Confucias well doth show, - A wealthy fool is the state's wont foe," vm. And the treasurer Whispered, bending low; "Great is the wisdom of King Tee Poh." --Qtorgc T. Lajiigaru m * % 8-i*£ ; • 'V^ ^' i- !»• * Wi'-vi- V • 4&H- ff h < [ % • t'c ^ V,> i Not long ago it was my good, or evil for­ tune, as the reader may determine, to spend Some two or three days at the little village i>f Bayville, on the shore of Long Island Bound. I arrived somewhere near the middle of the afternoon of a raw November llay, at the comfortable little hostelry of my Jriend Pitt»-- one of the old-time inn keep­ ers of Long Island, a gentleman who is my bean ideal of a landlord of the old fash­ ioned type, and who certainly knows how to make his guests more comfortable with |i skillet and two eggs than many a metro­ politan landlord with the resources of a veil stocked market at his disposal. I Arrived, of course, very hungry, and very tirc-d. having tasted nothing since eight ©'clock in the morning, and having been Almost steadily upon the road since five ji'cloek the preceding evening. Landlord Pitts soon made me entirely at home, and brought forth for my refreshment, even at that untimely hour, the very best which the ftouse aft'orded. As I thankfully sat down o my steaming repast. Mr. Pitts took his -$eat opposite nie, in that unobtrusive yet familir.r way, so pleasant to travelers who are used to home comforts and home so­ ciety, and remarked: "Lots of excitement in Bayville since you %ere here last." ,, "How BO?" I inquired, stopping opera­ tions, hungry as I was, and staring the landlord curiously in the face. ' "The headless ghost has been seen *gain." he replied, dropping his voice f.lmost to a whisper. "It's been more than our years simfe he put in his last appear- fence, and We were beginning to think he liad quieted down for good; but night before last, as Sam Edson was driving along peace­ fully on the lower Bay road, coming home from the village, what should he see rise t&p out of the rocks by the water's edge but It white figure. Sam's horse saw it too, and stopped still and snuffed the air like a dog. " " " there.' said Sam. 'Who are the figure answered not a alked slowly tip into the road, Sam could see, against the that it hadn't any head. Up to it was the perfect figure of a man, dressed all in white, but there it ended, ft didn't even carry its head under |ts arm, as headless ghosts are generally Said to do, but all the while it kept sort of -Swaying and stooping around, as if in Search of something. Sam says he felt his |>lood ran cold. The mare, too, began to fcick and snort. Sam hit her with the Ifrhip, but she wouldn't budge an inch, and Bam says he don't know as he wanted to fcave her, either. Finally she backed off the edge of the road, and Sam cramped the *"beel and turned around, keeping his eye t>n the ghost all the while, and when he got lieaded the other way, he says, if he didn't lay on that whip and rattle off he hcipes to tiever drive a fast horse again. He looked back over his shoulder once or twice, but toe ghost didn't seem to be minding him in the least--only just stooping and poking "along in the road, as if mortally anxious to find something it had lost. Sam stopped *ith me that night--didn't go home at all-- find a scareder fellow you never saw in your life. He kept me up talking and Smoking with him all night, because he was afraid to go to bed, and it wasn't till broad daylight that I could persuade him £o hitch tip and go home and quiet his -folks." During this recital I had kept my eyes fixed upon the landlord's face with a sort «f irresistible fascination, and when he (finally broke off the narrative, observing that I had scarcely touched food since he >egan, the spell of the strange story still lingered upon tte. * "i wouldn't 'a told you if I'd thought it Was going to take away vour appetite," he apologized. "We Bayville folks are so Used to the story of the headless ghost that it don't make a mite of difference with our digestive apparatus." 1 assured the landlord that my appetite i»*d in nowise been dissipated by the ex­ citing tale with which he had favored me, but only held in abeyance uutil the climax "was reached. Nevertheless--it may have been because the food had grown cold--I was Unable to t<ike hold with 111 v former £fusto, for, be it known to the gentle reader, it was absolutely necessary that I should pay a 'visit to a client of mine living on that very Bame lower Bay road, that very identical might. The businesa upon which t had traveled so far and so expeditiously was of the utmost importance, and I would not only have lost my fee, as well as the pros­ pect of a future fortune, but also my repu­ tation and my self-respect, if I had allowed a common countryside ghost story to if tighten me out of a professional engage­ ment. ^ As I finished my late afternoon repast, in the gathering dusk of the late Novem­ ber evening. I gleaned, by a series of close ouestions, the following facts from mine host with respect to the headless ghost. More than twenty years ago--in the eady fall of 1863--the headless bodv of a * was fcrand among the rocks, on the chore of Long Island Sound, a few tods from the road between Bayville and Center Island--the lower Bav road, as it was called by the natives. The body was badly mutilated, and the head, which had, ap- ; pareatly, been severed from the body by •ome dull, heavy, and jagged instrument, ' WMffpwhere to be found. The pedaler had evidently been murdered for the purpose of robbery. His pockets were rifled, and the less valuable contents of his pack ' Wei» scattered in every direction. The previous it is known that he visited Island and collected quite it sum of money, for which, un­ doubtedly, he was murdered; but why his head should have been severed from his body, and especially why it should have been so carefully removed or concealed that it oould not anywhere be found, are mysteries which have never been solved. Ever since the time of the murder, at ir­ regular intervals, sometimes years elapsing between his successive visits, the figure of the headless peddler has been seen wan­ dering up and down in the vicinity of the spot where the tragedy took place. Many witnesses have seen the strange apparition, and all unite in describing it as a headless figure, with a slow and uncertain gait, and a forward-leaning attitude, as if in constant search for something lying just in front of it. I asked the landlord if it generally ap­ peared for several nights in succession, after its long periods of disappearance, and he replied that it did, invariably, and that anyone who traveled along the "lower Bay road after dark, for six or seven nights succeeding its first coming, would be pretty sure to meet with it. AViih this cheering and positive assur­ ance, I retired for a few hours' steep before taking my lonely trip to the house of my eccentric client on the shore of the Sound". At eight o'clock, well bundled into a light, narrow buggy, behind landlord Pitts' best horse, and with a comforting cigar between my lips, I started out on my somewhat unenviable ride along the gloomy shone of the Sound. I had not told Mr. Pitts where I was going, nor the road I M as to take. Perhaps, if I had. he would not have entrusted me with his best horse. I only told him that I was going to see one of my clients twho lived about six miles off, and would probably be back a little after midnight. He called after me to "be sure and keep off the lower Bay road," but as that was the enly road leading to the house of my client, I did not very well see how I could avail myself of his advice. I struck the lower Bay road at the cor­ ners, and dashed off down the rock shore at a good round pace. A small apology for a moon was hanging low in the western sky, and cast a fitful and feeble light on the black waters of the Sound, the jagged rocks between me and the shore and the gnarled and shapeless cedars on the other side of the road. For more than fifteen minutes I bowled along without seeing or hearing anything nnusual, although I could not help casting my eyes apprehensively along the ugly wilderness of boulders that lined the lonely road. I was beginning to congratulate myself that my fears were groundless, after all, and that the headless ghost of Bayville was nothing but a myth born of the credulous imagina­ tion of the natives, when my horse sud­ denly shied, and 'with a motion so quick and unexpected" that I was almost thrown from the carriage. I looked up, and there, directly ahead, in the middle of the road, was a white figure, standing motionless. My heart jumped into my throat, but I managed to speak a soothing word to the horse, reining him in with a firm hand, and taking the whip from the socket. I was resolved to go ahead at all events, if possi­ ble. The road was so narrow at that point that I could not have turned around had I wished, and my impressions of the urgency of the business which brought me there were still strong enough to enable me to control my fear. I touched the horse lightly with the whip, and he sprang for­ ward for a few bounds and then came to a sudden halt, shivering in every limb. I saw that I must aiight if I wished to avert a catastrophe, 6o I jumped quickly over the wheel, with the reins still in my hands, and leaping forward caught the horse by the bit. I was now wirhin a few rods of the ap*- paritiou, and directly facing it. I shall never forget the sensations which crept over me, as I stood with that struggling horse at my side and the unearthly iignre of the murdered peddler blocking my path. I could see the apparition with the utmost distinctness. It was that of a medium sieed man, broad but somewhat stooping, with long arms and immense hands. A portion of the neck remained upon the headless trunk, its jagged edges showing how rude and imperfect must have been the instrument with which the head was severed from the body. All these horrible details Hashed over me in an instant, as I stood facing the ghost. I could feel the hair tingling and rising up straight on my head, and cold shivers ran down my back in a steady stream. I was prob­ ably the first person who had ever de­ liberately held his ground so close to t he dread apparition, and I am inclined to think that, if ghosts are capable of sur­ prise, that headless peddler was consider­ ably taken a back by my temerity. "What do you want?" I demanded, in a hollow voice. "Get out of my road!" At the same time I pulled at the horse's bit and took a step forward. The horse reared and snorted, broke my hold on his bit, and with a strange infatuation plunged forward, brushing me aside, and bounded do,wn the road with the thunderous speed of an avalanche. Whatever became of the ghost 1 don't know. I picked myself up in a hurry and stared about me. No sign of a presence anywhere, actual or spiritual. Far down the road I could hear the thunder of the runaway's hoofs, and--blessed sound--the stentorian shout of a native trying to stop him in his wild career. I lifted my voice in reply, and started doWn the road as fast as I could run. Once or twice I was ter­ ribly tempted to glance back over my shoulder, but I knew if I did I should see the headless ghost pursuing me. Finally, all breathless and with trembling limbs, ! arrived at a little house by the roadside, and told my story to the stalwart man who was waiting for me thei'e. "Yes, you have seen him, sure," he re­ marked, sapiently, as I concluded. "You might have known it--and this being his time, too." "I suppose yon didn't see which way my horse went?" I inquired. "Yes. I did," he replied, in a cool, matter of fact way. "He went into my barn there. I caught him for you." Ten minutes later I was sitting opposite my client, and discussing a bottle of sherry. "You shan't go back to-night," he said. "Not for the world!" I exclaimed. And I didn't. ... At the i*ate of a Convent. _ I fancy tliere is a time in every girl's life when she wants to go to a convent. A girl always once in her life falls in love with a married man, falls into a pure, fervent, holy love that is de­ liriously hopeless. She sobs and sighs and dreams and weeps, and then the cloister seems to be the only place tliat can give her life its finish. This lasts a week or so, and then she goes to a ball, dances with a young man of un­ principled sentimentality, and after that they are at the opera and the park and the Cliff House in tnrn all the time. It's awfully lucky if the girl meets the married -man early in life. There are only a few men like Charles Warren Stoddard who want to be monks. Nature predestines the monks, but circumstances make the nun. I have heard of a young woman who made up her mind that the world, with its pomps and vanities, was not for her. So one day she laid away all her finery, ail her jewelry, the gauds tliat women wear and men pay for, and knocked at the gate of a convent. I am not quits sure of the course of preparation necessary for being a nun, but this young lady went through it all up to the very last ceremony. After that ceremony the world would see her no more, and it -was at hand. She could yet turn back. She did. She left the convent after dark one nighty having declared her desire to do so, and next morning early her friends met her walking down Kearney street in a full-blown bustle and a bang, and all the fixings of a girl of the period. San FraneAxco Chronial*. - v THERE are many men who delight in playing the fool, but who get angry the moment they are told so. Cartons and Interesting Experiments by Two Swim Savants. Of all the senses we possess the sense of touch is at once the most com plex and the least understood. Blind­ ness and deafness are only too common, and we can all more or less appreciate the nature and extent of these dire afflictions. But who ever thinks how he would be affected by deprivation bf the capacity to feel, inability to dis­ tinguish by touch between smoothness and roughness, heat and cold, or by an impaired power to receive the various sensations of pain and pleasure which reach us through the surface of tho body ? How is it that the same finger which tells us that a substance is hard or soft, tell us also that it is hot or cold? Have we, as some physiologists aver, a sixth sense, that of temperature ? If not, how comes it that a single touch of the finger conveys to the brain, in the same instant, two distinct impres­ sions, jperhaps three, for the substance in question may be wet, as well as hot or cold, hard or soft? Physiologists cannot tell us; they only know that the sensations so conveyed are separable, and that the ways by which they reach the brain are not the same. The sub­ ject is by no means new, but fresh light has lately been thrown on it by the researches of two Swiss savants, M. A. Herzen and Prof. Soret. The observations of these gentlemen, besides being highly interesting, psychologic­ ally as well as physiologically, are of considerable practical importance in their relation to the training of the blind. Pressure on a limb--as, for instance, when we are asleep lying on one of our arms--if continued for some time, makes it more or less numb. It grad­ ually loses the power of transmitting sensation to the brain. According to the observations of Mr. Herzen, the first sense lost is that of touch, the second that of cold, the third that of pain, the last that of heat. He says that when one of his arms is so torpid that he has to feel for it with the other, and it is impervious to a pinch or a prick, it is still sensible to the warmth of the other hand. If the pressure be prolonged, the limb ceases to be af­ fected even by heat. There are people otherwise healthy, whose capacity of feeling is so far incomplete that they never know what it is to be cold so far as sensations conveyed by the skin are concerned. Winter is the same as summer. This probably arises from an abnormal condition of the spinal cord. M. Herzen mentions the case of an old woman whose legs, partially paralyzed, could feel only pain and- cold. At her autopsy it was found that the spinal cord in the neighborhood of the nervous centers of the back was shriveled and otherwise in an unhealthy state. But Mr. Herzen has not rested content with observations on his own species; he has made experiments on the lower animals, classified several of the sensations of touch, and discovered their localizations in the organism; and Prof. Soret, taking up the psycho­ logical branch of the subject, has tried to find out how far the sense of touch may be made to convey to the sightless an idea of the beautiful. For as a deaf musician may **ijoy music, despite his deafness, so may the blind^man find pleasure in beauty of form, notwitl»- standing his blindness. In the 6ne case the pleasure comes from the rythm, or rather from sonorous vibrations in the air, produced by the playing; in the other form the symmetry and regular­ ity of the object handled. "When music is going on I feel some­ thing here," said to M. Soret a deaf- mute who enjoyed operas, putting his hand on his stomach. The blind, even those born blind, as Prof. Soret has ascertained by inquiries among the in­ mates of the blind asylum of Lau­ sanne, have the same love of symmetry as the deaf. The girl embroiderers at­ tach much importance to the perfect regularity of the designs which they are required to repeat in their work. The basket-makers insist on the willow withes they use being all straight and of the same length. Solutions of con­ tinuity in the things they handle are, to the blind, indications of ugliness. They like evenness of surface, regular­ ity of shape; a cracked pot, a rough table or a broken chair causes them positive discomfort. But to create in the mind of a person born blind an artistic idea involves a measure of psychological development which it is very difficult to impart and requires from both teacher and scholar great patience and long-sustained effort.-- Pall Mall Gazette. Mistaken Mortals. There are a great many things that we mean to do in our households, in the matter of the amelioration of manners, of refinement, and of customs, of a dif­ ferent and nobler mode of intercourse, of a better culture for our children, and of a purer and sweeter conversation day by day; that is, we are going to do these thing*. Men are constantly put­ ting off things whieh they are disposed to do, and purposing by-and-by to at­ tend to them. In the first place, I protest against that style of doing business which takes a man out of his family to so great an extent as it does with many men. It is often the case that men who are doing business in our great cities get up and go away so early that their children do not see them in the morning, and come back so late at night that their children nave gone to bed before they get home. In many cases it is only on Sunday that there is anything like a family day; and that is a languid day-- a day of rest from weariness, on account of the ex­ cessive pressure of occupation. And there is this everlasting excuse, that if a lfcan is going to do business in New York, he must do as others do there. It is a question, then, whether you will do your duty to your household, to your children that you brought into life, and for whose care you are re­ sponsible, or whether you will give up to the inexorable demands of business. I do not believe there is any need of such addition to business as makes it necessary for a man to give up his mornings and his evenings. I do not believe that a business is profitable to which one's whole time iB devoted. I believe that any business, the success of which depends upon tho action of the brain, is better conducted in eight hours than in twelve or ten. I believe that the spreading of one's self over an excessive broad space induces an ele­ ment of feebleness in business. I be­ lieve that it is better to contract the water that we have into a narrow chan­ nel than to let it spread wide over the whole meadow, and so lose depth and strength. What right has a man to stand in the relation of a father to a household, and be forever absent from that household ? "The mother," it is said, "takes care of the children." There may be such canes as ̂those of seamen," who >are obliged to go on errands around the world, in which case the mother must necessarily bear all the responsibility of bringing up the children---but it is a great misfortune wherever it occurs. Then there is an element of unnatural ness in it--and it should be avoided wherever it is in any way possible to do so. It is the duty of every Christian man to stand by the side of his partner, and help her in teaching and raring the children in the family. The father and mother are both necessary. The man and the woman make the one unit which God meant in the creation of the race. Often men who live such an un­ natural life, look forward to the time when their business shall be in such a state that they can attend to their households. They say it shall be a year longer, and the neit year, and the year following, and the year after they tumble into the grave. They are al­ ways "going to." I{ is always "by -and by" with them. Then there are those infelicities which exist in one's own self--for there are few persons who are perfectly har­ monious; and this life is a school in which we are to study harmony. It is here that we are to learn how to love. Nobody knows, off hand, how to love. There is an impulse of loye; there is a sentiment of affection; but true love is a thing to be developed by education. No matter how good an ear for music one may have, lie cannot be a master of music, and excel, if he, does not bring genius to the bench of industry and edr ucate it; and one of the most subtle and difficult of all the attainments of man is the power of loving. Nature did not give ,us everything that we need to en­ able us to love. In nothing do we n6ed more education and culture, and drill, than in that; and the household is the school where it is to be learned. Now, men go into this relation of marriage, and of household care, with­ out thought, or with only the jauntiest notions; but when they come into the family and find where asperities are, where repulsions are, if they be right- minded, they commune with them­ selves, and say: "This must be mended, my hasty temper must be controlled; and I will control it." But when? The night cometh; and, if anything is to be done, with your temper, it must be done now.' To roll it off and say: "Sometime; by-and-by; when I have less to annoy and hinder me"--that is not wise. Oh! how many times I have seen uninterrupted tears drop from the eyes of those who were returning from the grave!--Rev. Henry WardBeecher. Roaring lYmwpiid. Pemaquid Point, near Damariscotta, Me., has been said to be, in a gale from any point of the compass between south­ east and southwest, the roughest point on, the Atlantic coast. It is literally out to sea, and the waves of the At­ lantic, rolling in from 3,000 miles of ocean, without let or hindrance, break with explosive roar upon its bastions of stone, which are worn into endless forms by the attrition and abrasion of ages. It is very rarely that any point of the mainland possesses all the con­ ditions of an uninterrupted breaking place for the waves of the ocean. Out­ laying rocks or islands or the conforma­ tion of the adjacent coast usually break up or check the course of the waves long before reaching the mainland. Nothing lies between Pemaquid Point and the broad Atlantic, and even in the calmest mood of the sea the roar of the surf upon its walls is remarkable. When the southerly gale is on the spray is flung hundreds of feet into the air. The noise is deafening. Huge pieces of rock are broken from the walls and thrown up on the bank. Pemaquid lighthouse stands on the promontory, several hundred feet back from the edge, with the house of the keeper adjoining it. The light is at least three hundred feet ab»ve the sea level. Yet in a southern gale a few years ago, a large stone was hurled by the waves through the thick glass of the lantern, and the spray came down the chimneys of the house in such quantities as to extinguish the fires. History and legend also lend their attractions to Pemaquid. No part of the country was earlier known to voy­ agers. The ships of Pring, Weymouth, and Gilbert, had ploughed these waters long before the settlement of James­ town, and Pemaquid was the rival of Plymouth and Boston as a metropolis in the infancy of New England. The old fort at the harbor was for near a century on the disputed territory be­ tween Massachusetts and Arcadia. Gov. Chamberlain claims for Pema­ quid an older date than Plymouth. "Few know," he says, "that years be­ fore the Pilgrims set foot on Plymouth sands, there were established English settlements at various points on the shores of Maine--that Pemaquid was a seat of trade, and at one time the me­ tropolis of all the region oast of New York."--Rockland Courier-Gazette. Points About Feet. I don't believe that it is when a wo­ man has a small foot that she wants to show it just a little. I am open to seri­ ous correction, but there seems to l>e quite a satisfaction to a woman in know­ ing that she has a pretty foot, and a woman has a way anyhow of believing everybody knows what she knows un­ less it be a secret. Then she never be­ lieves that anybody else knows even if she's told it them a dozen times. But when a woman has a small foot and has had it all her life, and known it and been told about it for twenty years--I beg pardon, no lady is ever over that age, say ten vears--she gets so accus­ tomed to it that it ceases to be a piece even of her vanity. It's the woman with the long foot and the high instep that wants to show them. The high in­ step sometimes goes before a fall, and that's why people witli high insteps are always said to have plenty of pride. When a woman has succeeded in pinch­ ing a big foot into a very small shoe she does not propose that all- that trouble is to be gono to and all that ag­ ony suffered for nothing. So she al­ ways makes a point of having it dis­ played somehow. I beg pardon of the ladies for thus drawing attention to something I have no business with. I think the rudest thing I ever heard of was what one of the papers said about Mrs. Langtry, that after one of her scenes several of the ladies threw flow­ ers at her feet. Mobbing her was all very well, but throwing flowers at her feet was carrying things too far and an outrage. Did you ever see a woman try on a pair of shoes? You have! Then you're either married or engaged in a shoe store, I hope. She had a lovely foot, and her visi­ tors were admiring it. They were la­ dies, of course. A man who is not a shoemaker dares not mention such a thing unless they arc alone in a dim corner of the drawing-room where no­ body can overhear. "What a beautiful foot you have, dear." "Yes; pa says when we go to Europe hell have a bust of it made." Song I-- San Francisco Chronicle. TdUe Kttqaatti taBwtkmd. But social etiquette in Holland is not to be compared to that of &e table. If the one is curious, the Mlher is su­ premely droll. It is *mn«ring to see the Dutch eat. They take their plate ful as soon as they are helped, and cut it up into morsels. Then they lay the knife in front of the plate, and leaning on the table with the left hand, pro­ ceed to eat all with the fork. I never saw food eaten otherwise, except that some desserts are shoveled with a spoon instead of the fork, two spoons lying with knife and fork at each plate. All this is etiquette. Beside the plate a hand-rest is sometimes placed, for it'is necessary that one should half recline on the table. There is no such thing as changing covers, and be the courses two or twenty, they are served on the same plate, and the same knife, fork, and spoon are used. The napkins are kept in service until the washerwoman has to meet a big bill for soap! The meals are breakfast, lunch (koflij), din­ ner, and supper. The first meal is at any time from 6 to 9, and among the better class of people the guests can take'it in bed if they prefer. Lunch is at 12 o'clock; dinner from 4c to 5:30; supper is at any time--7, 9, or 11 o'clock in the evening. Breakfast and lunch are exactly alike except that there is tea at the former, and coffee at lunch. Supper consists of tea, biscuits, and pastry, and is served in the parlor quite as often as in the dining-room. One supper at which I was a guest I shall always remember. At 9 o'clock the hostess left the card-board, spread the tablecloth, and placed the dishes. Then she brought out a spirit lamp, which she lighted with a match from the match-box on the table, and having ground some coffee in a hand-mill, she set the cafetiere over the lamp, where it boiled merrily during the meal. The bread came on in a loaf in a long basket, and was cut into thick slices and so passed around. The butter was in a little round earthen pot, each person scraping out with his own knife as much as is wanted for each piece of bread. The cheese came to the table in a simi­ lar pot, and was also scraped and eaten spread on the bread over the butter. Near the bread basket on a round tray Avar; a partly cut loaf of brown bread, a*d slices of three or four kinds of cake, including the invariable fruit-cake. Preserves were placed on the cloth in a shallow dish, and it was passed around. The milk, fresh from the dairy, was drawn for the coffee from a jug that in the absence of a sideboard naturally re­ posed on a mat at my lady's side. After the meal a china wash-bowl was brought out, and the dishes washed on the tea- table by the mistress, who used the snowiest of serviettes, and neither spilt a drop nor wet her fingers. While the disli-washing was going on, the family and guests remained sitting, the hos­ tess performing her task standing where her cliair had been, and the master idly puffing his reina. All this may seem quite romantic, but I was annoyed, not only at the basket of bread, the sloppy scraping of butter, and the continual hissing of the coffee over the spirit- lamp, but as well to have dish-water used on the table, and to have the mistress preside over it. But it was "the fashion," and I might add that the table was that of Prof. Yanderkamer of the Hague.--Springfield Republican- Senator Ransom's Story. "It seems to read so," said Sam Ban- som, of North Carolina, in response to something; probably a clause in some bill that was shown him. Another sen­ ator, standing by, made some laughing criticism upon the expression. "You don't know North Carolina slang," said Mr. Hansom. "An old tavern-keeper in one ofr our pine-wood towns, was a rough, half- pious, wholly honest man, who utterly declined to bet. But one of his guests, a professional gambler, could not live without some excitement of the sort. One day he insisted on laying a bet that the name on a sign across the street was spelled without the r it needed to make it a name. Every one could see that the r was there, but he would bet; and finally the landlord took him up, and of course the man lost. He stayed on, however, a %eek or two; but finally packed his bag and called for his bill. The place was too slow for him. The landlord gave him the bill, $160. The man looked at it, and then said: 'Do you ever read the Bible, landlord ? Were you piously brought up ?'" " 'Oli! yes, I know my catechism now, and I read the Bible--more or less.' ",'Do you know the story of Sam­ son?' " 'Well, I guess. I was brought up on that. My mother told it to me when I wasn't knee high.' "Ah! What kind of a jaw-bone was it that Samson killed the Philistine with? I'll bet you don't know.' " 'Why it was a jaw-bone--just a jaw­ bone, and nothing more.' " 'I thought so. I'll bet you $165 that it was a new jaw-bone.' "It was too much for the landlord. He succumbed again, although he felt as before that lie was betting on a cer­ tainty; 'but, if the man would do it -- "The man took a little worn Bible out of his bag. turned to the chapter in Judges, and read that, with 'the new jawbone of an ass, did Samson slay Philistine.' "The landlord turned round, saying: "Look for it in my mother's Bible?' taking it down as he spoke. "The gambler found it, and held the text under his eyes. " 'It seems to read so,' said the land­ lord in a humbled tone, feeling the whole board bill float away from him as he spoke. "And it has been adopted in North Carolina slang ever since.--New York Independent. The Last of the Brigands. A Vienna correspondent writes: The last of the Hungarian brigands, Savanyu Joszi, has fallen into the hands of jus­ tice, and is being tried like a common criminal. The "poor fellows," us they were called by the peasants, were once renowned in Hungarian history, and the life of Ilosza Sandor is still sold in thousands of copies at every fair, but the age of chivalry is gone, and Savanyu Joszi and his band will probably be found guilty -of some twenty-seven crimes, set forth in the indictment, ranging from murder to theft, and if they escape hanging they may count themselves fortunate. When Mme. Adam was in Hungary the brigand sent her his photograph, and the stories of his romantic doings in western Hungary are numberless. IT takes four things to make a gentle­ man--you must be a gentleman in your principles, a gentleman in your tastes, a gentleman in your manners, and a gentleman in your person. ?AWT and powder cover a multitude of freckles. HMM Speculators. There is probably no form of industry so universally discouraged in the West as that of horse stealing. Go where you will in the great, broad land to the west of the Mississippi and no one seems to have a kind word for the horse thief. To be sure the ambitious dealer in the general public's horse flesh who is anxious to rise in the world is fre­ quently helped by a well-disposed posse of citizens, but generally with so much violence that he is more or less afflicted with throat trouble afterwards. No horse thief can pursue his voca­ tion with any degree of satisfaction while suspended from a telegraph pole and the subject of remarks reflecting on his character by every passer-by. He may be able to lay out future busi­ ness, but when he comes to get down and carry it into execution he is very apt to find that he is dead. No man has ever accomplished much in this world with the coroner staring him in the face. This style of reception is apt to dis­ courage the young and rising horse thief. When he gets discouraged be­ fore he begins to rise it is a bad thing for the community; he may turn his attention away from his profession and perhaps run for the Legislature. It would seem as if when we have regular collections for the benefit of the native gentlemen of the Tomahawk Islands and charitably disposed ladies can be found to send flowers to every other condemned criminal that some one ought to have a kind word for the over-worked horse thief. It would seem as if tho poor but honest horse thief struggling along, and perhaps burning the midnight oil and running the danger of getting his brains kicked out while adjusting a halter on some one's imported horse is entitled to as much sympathy as the skrinking and retiring member of the Legislature running around trying to see how much he can get for his vote. The cold and pulseless remains of the hard-working horse thief are swinging from the tall timber all the way through to the Pacific coast. This looks bad for the country and injures the trees. It is time that it was stopped. It is time that a society was organized to reach the horse thief other than in the usual way with a step-ladder. It is time a committee went to the horse thief and took him by the hand instead of adjusting a three-quarter-inch rope just below his ears. If we can't do this the horse thief ought to at least be given the same chance as the bank cashier and be allowed to go to Canada. During all these years the coroner has been the only man who ever went to the horse thief in the way of a friend. While all the rest of the community is pulling at the other end of the rope the coroner alone holds out a hand. And even he never gets around till after the horse dealer's pulse has ceased opera­ tions. The horse thief is one of the few persons who feels that the whole neighborhood is pulling against him. It is no wonder that he is apt to get dis- hearted when he realizes, as he must at some time during his business career, that the mayor and common council, and five or six candidates for the post- office, with other prominent citizens, are all laying back and throwing their weight on the rope. Some of the changes which we have briefly noted would make life look much brighter to the horse thief. If they are thought too sweeping to be adopted at once we would suggest that they be worked up to gradually, and that hereafter at least the rope l>e fastened to the tree with a spiral spring like a canary bird-cage to a hook.-- Estelline Bell. The Bell-Bird. The traveler in tropical portions of South America is often surprised to hear the distinct and measured tolling of a bell in localities where there is no settlement within many leagues. If he undertakes to follow the sound and trace it to its source, he will be sur­ prised to find that it proceeds from a bird, which, perched at the top of a lofty tree, utters its peculiar note, which so resembles the sound of a bell as to make the name bell-bird appro­ priate and descriptive. The sound is said to be distinctly heard at a distance of three miles. The bird utters its note all through the day, even in the hottest portions, when the fierce heat has silenced all other birds. The bell-bird (chasmorhynchus niveus) is noted for the great difference between the sexes in plumage. The male is white throughout, while the female is a dusky green color. The male bird has a curious appendage, in the form of a tube about three inches in length, at­ tached to the base of ° the bill. This tube is jet black, dotted all over with minute downy feathers. Ordinarily, this tube hangs down on one side, but the bird is able to inflate it with air, when it stands erect. There are three other species belonging to the same genus with the bell-bird, the males all being very different frdln the females. The males of one of the species are snow white, with a large space of naked skin on the throat and around the eyes. These naked places during the breed­ ing season become of a fine green color. The bell-bird is about twelve inches long. It belongs to the same family (Ampelidae) as our waxwing and the cedar bird. In Australia, a country noted for its singular birds, and other strange forms of animal life, there is a bell-bird, but belonging to a different family from the South American species. The note of the Australian bird re­ sembles that of a sheep bell rather than that of a distant church bell. When its note is produced, as it often is, by hundreds of birds altogether, the effect is said to be most singular.--American Agriculturist. Satisfied with Them. "Let me see some of your black kid gloves," said Mrs. Snaggs to a clerk at a Fifth Avenue store. 'These are not the latest style, are they ?" she asked, when the gloves were produced. "Yes, madam," replied the clerk, "we have had them in stock only two days." "I didn't think tbey were, because the fashion-paper says that black kids'have tan stitches, and vice versa, I see the tan stitches but not the vice versa." The clerk explained that vice versa was French for seven buttons, and Mrs. Snaggs bought the gloves.--Pittsburgh Chronicle. Where He Was Baptized. "My friend," he said, in solemn tones, to the passenger in the seat ahead,"are you a Christian?" "Well, I hope so," replied the passenger, somewhat startled. "Ah! then you have been baptized in the church?" "No, sir; I was baptized in the river. Pm a Baptist.--New York Times. " WHEN a man uses high words he is in •ery low busineni. « PITH A5D FOIST. : THE hare is hunted by the hounds^ but the Welsh rarebit is followed by thSi! nightmare. " 1| AN intelligent bull always chargeB at a red flag. There are really some goodie points in a bull. A BANANA skin rightly located form* as much of an obstruction to Hie high* ' ' way as would a mule. : "JEFFERSON DAVIS," says a Ghicagcfe newspaper, "speaks elegant English. %' Yes, but he speaks rather too much of it.--Arkansaw Traveler. ^ HE (at the horticultural show)--Thi|A is a tobacco plant, my dear." She--? "Indeed! how very interesting! Bat I .. don't see any cigars on it." . . ? ~ V - A PATENT-MEDICINE maker advertised • "nnparalleled cures, incredible were - they not in our midst." That is thdj? * place where cures should be effected i£ • anywhere. "JAKE, vat you going to gif yotur son r a birthday present?" "I don*<3 f°r know; it's putty hard times. I guess haf some buddons Bewed on his clothes. "Yes, dat's so. I guess I haf my boy'a hair cut." YOUNG amateur (president of newly* formed village dramatic society)--Oif; don't let's try anything very hard af first; Let's begin with some easy playr like "Box and Cox," or "Much AdoC About Nothing." IT was the frequent saying of an 01$ hunter in the North woods: "If all mei| knew as much as some dogs, foolsi would be skusser'n they are now." He was a wise old hunter, too.--New- Haven Palladium. • A FEW days since a gentleman saw ,b- little 6-year-old fellow playing during^ ' school hours, about a quarter of a mild • from home and inquired: "Johnny, why are you not at school ?" "Mother wad ' sick, and I staid home to take care of her," was the ready reply. "IF you would get at the truth of this matter I advise you--" "The truth of the matter! Great Caesar's ghost! What do you suppose I care about the truthi- of the matter? All I want is to hava"/ my prejudices backed up. If you caii <• tell me who will do that for me III thank you."--Boston Transcript. IN Kansas they hanged a man to the Sommel of a saddle on a fractious orse an then frightened the horse and let him go. The animal ran five miled^? and the man was probably the wors0 Eommeled man that ever died. Anc^l e wasn't guilty of horse-stealing either --he had merely murdered a woman.-- Judge. \ CAPT. BANGS--"I always understood that Jones was shot in the discharge of ' his duty." Private Bungs--"Well, somtjf'• '•/ say he was shot in the sutler's stored • '. ̂ and others say he was shot in the leg; but he got his pension for nervous pros­ tration brought on by dodging the pro­ vost-guard in Washington."--Lowell Citizen. ' • STRANGER (to country store keeper}- --"Can you tell me where I can fintfj-- James Holt, who wrote this recom-* ; mendation for Coffin'^ consumption^ : cure ? He lives here, I believe." Mer-";*;^--: chant--"He did before--" Stranger--t. !J "Before what?" Merchant--"Before* * he died of consumption."--N. Y. Graphic. THIS is not the only enterprising country in the world. An English ad­ vertisement reads as follows: "A young man, sober and reliable, who has a wooden leg and cork arm, is willing, for a moderate salary, to allow his false limbs to be maimed by wild beasts in any reputable menagerie, as an adver­ tisement. No objection to traveling." PROFESSOR at Vassar College--"Now, young ladies, I propose to lecture on human anatomy, but I cannot while there is so much bustle among you." All--"Professor, we can take our bus­ tles off." Professor (confused)---"I--I didn't mean it that way. You misun­ derstood me." All--"Ah, thanks. You think they are out of shape, but they are in style." "BROMLEY, I'm in an awful humor this morning. I had an awful quarrel with my wife." "I'm sOrry to hear you say that, Mr. Darringer. But it canbe§V »S: remedied, don't you think ? You have ' • only to offer the pipe of peace, you, ; S ' know." "O, hang your pipe, Bromley. The whole trouble was about a pipe." "I didn't know you smoked." "I don't. It was a stove-pipe that smoked." YOUNG Mr. Smythe was passionately enamored of Miss Browne, and was squirming in his chair preparatory to a proposal, when the young lady said: 'Mr. Smythe, yon pass Mr. Thinplate, the jewelers, on your way home, do you not?" "Yes," he said huskily. "Well, would you mind doing me a little favor?" "Mind! dear Miss Browne," he replied, with a look of unutterable reproach; "you have but to name it." "Thanks! Will you kindly ask Mir. Thinplate if he has tightened the setting of my engagement ring which Mr. George Simpson left with him yester­ day." ,-u. How French Girls Are Wooed* I remember, just before the Prussian war, a Mdlle. Pairier, a very witty and intelligent girl of 18, at­ tended the day-school in which I was teaching. She had passed her examin­ ations at l'Hotel de Yille, but was so fond of her school that she protested . she would not leave it until it was time for her to be married. She was a privileged character among the teachers and pupils--a sort of parlor boarder. One day she came running to us and said: "Mamma has seriously gone to work to find me a husband. I saw a candidate last night at the theater, but I don't like him. He squints. I -am going to see another at the Opera Comique to-night." The next morning our question was: "How did you like him?" "Can't like him; papa lieardt that his property was entailed, and that his father died of some hereditary disease." Thus, every morning, to our amusement, she would come with a new story, told in her own sprightly way. Once she told us that one of her mother's horses was lamed; she sup­ posed that he (the horse) was heartily tired of running after a husband for her. At last she found the right one, or rather the right one was found for her. She then at once stopped joking, and. with the dignity she at once as­ sumed as a fiance, she forbade us so to do. Her husband is a rich manu­ facturer of cloth at Elboeuf.--^Brooklyn Eagle. . A STORY is told of an American pro­ fessor whose specialty was entomology. Some of his students, wishing to test his knowledge, prepared a lAg with great care, making it up of the wings, iegs, &c., of the different insects. , Carrying it to the professor, they said, £ "Professor, here is a strange specimen | that Ave have found. Can you classify * it?" The professor studied it a few moments, and then said, quietly, ' " 0 » t i I * S -* • * < . • '

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