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, £- rnrgflam^alci ft. VAN *LY*E, Editor «nd NMtiM# ^ ILLINOIS. SHEPHERD LULLABY^. TCb* silver moon high in the sky • A-through th > . lends is creepip ^ClM ftof t winds sigh a lullaby |i; W bile bonnie bairn is Bleeping, Bash, babv.--hush. my darling I ;J Heisho; Hi--laddie t K 'Oat iu the night, wee jusper-stars v Above thv cot are peeping, •.And at. th v f i le sweet angels bide. r Their silent watches keeping-- • Sleep, baby, sleep 1--bo weary, Thy mother, loves 'her dearie 1 ' v - C ""iv.r,;; «>, - >Hu«h, littAe one, and take thy re With peaceful dreams begnili >Cp<m thy breast the fairies nost, Their dewy lips a Riniltng. Httsta, baby,--hush, mv d&rU»g!p;?*;1. Heigho; Hi--l<ddie! •'Bo clooe thy drowsy blue-bell eyes With never a thought of sighinp . • On Wisty wing, while .eltlus siug, 4 Old witches are o-flying ' *' Sleep, baby, sleep I--nor fear thee, "Thy uoother loveB her dearie! Seep, little lambkin, softly sleep, S'W'C I hear thy father calling. %'!<• 5 While be doth keep the gentle sheep Ghost shadows are a-folling; | Hush, baby,--hush, mv daHiu^l' Heigho; Hi--liuidie! Up in the sky a golden web The droiim-gods are sweaving, With tinkling song they Hit along ; Beware! They are deceivingt Sleep, baby, sleep!--so weary. . Thy mother loves her dearie. / / lib's Companion. ".AS THE TUEE FALLS. :WS r.: ?. yi' 'Wvi- >1 ; ,?*• *"w * Vi.', •'I r {^" • 'vtf Msi- itztP $fe>" la the woods, as elsewhere, time *oes OD, and Monday morning conies with all its depressing blueness to such as have spent the leisure hours dAce Saturday night in riotous living. For one# Frank's appetite failed -him. The work-ox beefsteak and de­ lectable flapjack were not to his lik­ ing. His muscular neighbor noticed it and said: 4'Better eat sump'n, or jfou'll never stand it till noon." Frank felt grateful for the consid- Wation, but did not act upon the ad- •Tice; whereupon his friend plied him with the coffee-pot, saying: "Here, then, drink some o' this to scald out wr coppers." <3 wit. no; the pains of a racking headache and disordered stomach were not to be soothed by cafe noir-- rery much noir and many times warmed up--so Frank got up and went out. Be seated himself on»the bench in "front of the coak-house to wait for •the others. The morning air was re­ freshing, and it enabled him to think coherently of .the recent woeful occur­ rence. He remembered it all now: the •white-fronted saloon, at the forks of (the road: the dingy, fowl-smelling bar-room; the cheap mirror and fix­ tures and the audacious pictures on tile walls; the card-littered floor and the reeking spittoons: the click of the poker chips and the quaint originality <of some of the blasphemy. Then the game. How he did win •at the beginning, and how the on­ lookers craned their necks to see how lie discarded: and when he "went his 'whole pile" on three jacks, and some •one behind him remarked, in a low 'time, "He's blooded, you bet yer!" how a feeling of confidence crept over him. "There's a home-stake to be won right here and now," he had said to himself. But the fates willed it ^otherwise, for Lucky Bob "called" him, and the "show-down" displayed three queens from the hand of the latter, which ended the game for JPrank. But they filled him up with "forty-rod" by way of consolation,and Ike struck out for camp by the light the moon. The railroad track, he remembered "thinking, must surely be narrower than standard gauge and the ties un­ necessarily close together, and there was something wrong with the moon, flnr she hid herself behind a cloud un- ftll t>e reached the high trestle, when, suddenly, she "unveiled her peerless light," that, glittering in the creek below, startled and perplexed him. Be had sat down to consider all these . matters, and there they had found Um soliloquizing, with many gestures and an occasional apostrophe, to the inconstant moon. He remembered itheir helping him home and putting 9rim~tobed. Alas! to be aroused in , "too short.a time by the tooting of the •elentlees horn. The retrospect ceased as the crew crt out from breakfast. The fore­ man stood by the door, and, with that strangely retentive memory which, many unlettered people posess, men- etally registered each who went to •work. Among the first was old Josh, •the filer, who took his position behind &is bench, and, with arms folded and matutinal pipe alight, waited for the #|in to climb a little before beginning this daily task of pointing teeth and ••Wedging rakers. . The crew, apart from the choppers \M.i|bd peelers, was divided into two gangs. Each gang had its comple­ ment of sawyers, chain tenders, and swampers, and each had a donkey- •engine to haul the logs from their "beds, where the sawyers left them, Unto the "snaking roads.'* The team took charge of them from there on, liauling from the two engines alter­ nately. Further back in the forest, the choppers and peelers worked col­ lectively for the two "outfits." - For one of these "outfits" Frank ,«awed chunks. A chunk-sawyership fe by no means an exalted position in (the wood-butcher brotherhood; still tit often serves as a stepping-stone to nomething better. The duties are to \ Cut into movable dimensions any ;: windfalls or worthless tree-tops that may lie in the way of the road-makers t, «.nd to remove the lighter obstructing 4ebris by hand. e He needed a sharpened saw. Josh |*r-Jfnust be interviewed* With a long- p vjtflrawn sigh, he arose and. walking ;; + " #earily across the track to where the , * . ^bencli stood, made known his wants . ,4 "How's the country where you're c fworkih' now?" asked the old man. IIr,'/;* "Steep," was the brief reply. "Here's what you want, then," fhanding down the implement from .•its resting-place against a huge stump r?-*"a-«tiffhacked saw for a sideling •country." Just then the "boss" came and ^»»id: "Guess you won't need that to- *day. Big John's partner's in town, * i;|8ick, or drunk, or sumthin', an' you'd N; 'Abetter go an' .work in his place." l1< ' No further instructions were needed. (The opportunity had come rat last. To fell a redwood had been Frank's aim ever since he hired out drogpUw £1* -'fetHMMck" uacere- •M moniously and forgetting all his woes, he hurried off to overtake his big Mend of the breakfast-table. It is expedient to adopt, for the time being and to a reasonable extent, the speech and manners of those with whom our lot is cast. Frank has learned this by bitter experience. His "grammar" and "airs" had been subjected to much ridicule when first he came. He had long since dispensed with both, and. furthermore, he now could wipo his mouth with the back of his hand after a meal and chew "saw-log plug" with the best of them. He overtook his big friend at the brow of the hill among the logs and rigging. The donkey-driver, or "en­ gineer," as he proudly styles himself, was busy getting up steam, and the pulsing of the pump contrasted strangely with the stillness of the morning--such stillness that the smoke f&m the little engine went straight up in a bright blue cloud. Over the divide, in the region beyond Jordan, the pure morning light her­ alded the sunrise. Out of breafhj be began, with the colloquial: , 5 "Say!" - « "gay it "Sweet Lip says for me to work in place of Alec, who ain't show'di up this morning." "Sweet Lip" was a nickname applied to the foreman, on account of his ability to hire high- priced men for less than standard wages. After an inquiry or two concerning his absent partner, John said, earn­ estly: "But, me son, did yiz ever chop any?" "Suckers for skids, stringers, and the like o'that." "There's a big difference between (hackin' down poles' and 'falliu' rid- woods.'" Frank knew, but he said nothing. The conversation became sparse, as they had now to walk in single file along the choppers' trail, and all signs of road-work were left behind. The way was over fallen trees and around stumps, down one side of a canon and up the other,endingatlast, in the chopping at the edge of the green timber. That'un '11 be the next," said John, pointing to an eight-foot tree of surpassing beauty. "She'si mid- dlin' soft, an' the grain is straight: You kin tell that by the bark, an' she's sound as a dollar. The green top shows it." •Cold, premeditated murder," Frank said to himself, and then aloud: "Which way are you goin' to send her?" Between them two stumps," point­ ing across the hill. "There ain't no room to spare; but if she's as near plumb as I think she is, I can land her safe enough." He took a plumb from his pocket, squinted up along the extended line at the tree, and was satisfied, for he said: "(Jet Alec's ax and snipe off the inner corners of both them stumps, whilst I fix the bed- diiitf." ' Both were soon busy; John, felling a couple of arrowy firs which he af­ terward cut up into movable lengths to be used in filling up a hollow that was in the line of direction, while Frank rounded off the stumps as in­ structed. The next tiling, after the bed was made, was the construction of the staging, or scaffold. They cut socket- holes in the tree and inserted the supports, known as "drivers." Across, from driver to driver, the stage-boards were placed, and on these the men now stood. The undercutting began when the big man, with the corner of his ax, had scratched a line on the face of the tree, to indicate the height and extent of the notch. The fibrous, springy bark is hard to cut, and keen axes will often bounce back without making a visible incision. "You'll have to hit a more slanting lick to get into it," John said. 'Hie effect was almost disastrous. Frank made a swipe at the tree, the ax glanced and hid itself between his feet. John stopped. "Now, me son," said he, ye must hit where you look, an' take your time, or you'll cut yer damn feet off." By noon the undercut was put in and the tree "gunned." A tree is "gunned" when a line drawn across the stump from corner to corner of the undercut-notch will be, at its center, at right angles to point where the top of the tree is intended to fall. A chopper's geometrical methods are simple. Stripping a fern of its leaves, and using the stem as a meas­ ure, he finds the center of the line aforesaid, and from this point ex tends a "gun-stick" at right angles. The "gun-stick" is straight and slen­ der and about four feet long. A square is not used to find the right angle; Fern-stalk measurement an­ swers the puapose fully as well. He then sights along the stick, and, if it points exactly in the intended direc­ tion, the work on the front of the tree is complete. If not, the notch, must be chipped into until it con­ forms to the mathematical require­ ments. After dinner, they moved their staging to the back of the tree and began sawing. This work came to Frank naturally. He was limber as an eel, and the swaying motion suited him. They rested occasionally. Dur ing one of these spells John said: "If you had as much sleight with the ax as you have with the saw, I'd ruther have you for a pardner thad Alec." When the saw was well buried, they drove wedges in the kerf, to keep the tree from pinching down, and then worked on until there were but a few inches of timber left between the saw- kerf and the undercut. * "Now, me, son, you kin take off your handle. The wedges'll do the rest," said John. It was done, and the saw withdrawn^ and carefully hidden away, and, in a trice, the woods were ringing with the indescribable sound that stetl sledges make when hammering steel wedges into the body of a tree to break its heart. Frank was getting a little nervous and his blows were uncertain and poorly directed, and the big man remarked: "Guess there's been a good many wedges you've never drove;" arid/' to atone for his sarcasm and encfttri-age the boy, continued: "Take yer time, me son. Make every lick count one, and don't try to hit too hard. D'ye know that little blows'll kill the devil! We've raised her some already. See! you kin stuff •our fingers tjie gap now," • wind WHEEL8-OMBN ON had sprung up, and was ing the green top. ' "No|||§|#teh when the wind swings her fnrat us, and tap the wedges in lively. She must have leaned back a little or she would have gone before now--and say, when she does get ready to go, don'get excited, but just watch your movements and take along that fallen tree yonder and don't look behind un- til you're under the shelter of the big stub, I'll look out for myself." Then he made a trumpet of hfe hands and shouted: ' 'Slash ways -- across -- the-***llill! Watch--out--h«-l-o-o-w!" • f Two peelers heard the warning, dropped their bars, and made off out of reach of limbs. The sledging went on, and there were a few snapping cracks, each of which made Frank's heart Jump; but he stayed until the last loud breaking boom, when they both jumped from the staging and ran to the stub. Slowly she began to sail, making a wider gap for the sky to be seen through; quickening by degrees, her top made a swishing sound as it .parted the air, faster and faster, Inoisier and noisier, grazing the stand­ ing trees nearly, and causing a show­ er of limbs. But she fell at length, with a crash that shook the earth, into the bed they had made for her, and at the same time the butt dropped off the stump. "Saved her! from butt to browse and from heart to bark, by the great Macanoy!" exclaimed the big man, when the commotion of sway­ ing trees and falling limbs had sub­ sided, and he was pacing back and forth on the trunk. "See how pretty she sits between the stumps. There ain't a foot of room on either sidef" Frank was elated, and wished that the absent partner would stay in town, "sick, or drunk, or sumthin," for the remainder of the season^ Per­ haps what followed was a judgment upon him for the wickedness of the wish--but I must tell the story. In a week, Alec had not come back and Frank was learning the craft rap­ idly. They had moved to a steep country where the timber was small and scattering. They felled most of the trees "up-hill,"--that is; the tops pointed up the hill and the butts, rested on or against the stump. "Hinging 'em on to the stump," is the way John expressed it when the butts rested on the stump. They "hinged" several, and Frank had asked him: * "Do thev ever take a notion to dip downhill?" "Yes. sometimes," was the reply. "What's a feller goin' to do to get out o' the way? They might roll over or flip up £nd come clear back over the stump." "That's so; but you've got to take chances, as in all the work in these bloody woods." They had shouted the warning, for the tree was beginning to topple over. Both men jumped. Frank ran to the right and John to the left. The tree, but a small one, fell; its top broke off about two-thirds up and the bulk of the trunk balanced--or seemed to balance--oq a knoll a,hove them. Then a strange thing happened. She swung to the right, her bark dropped off, and in her nakedness, like a yel­ low snake, she slid down the hill. John shouted, but it was too late. He saw the extended arms and heard the choking groan, and the thought of it all made the strong man sick. That evening they held a meeting in the bull-pen to talk the matter over. Josh was appointed adminis­ trator. He fortified himself with an unusually large chew of tobacco, ad­ justed his spectacles very carefully, and then reverently examined the boy's effects. He found a photograph of the girl at home, of course, and a few letters. He read the letters--to himself, and then addressed the as­ semblage. His Voice ffrembled a little: ' , i "See here, fellers!" said hii, "this yer boy warn't no or'nary sciab. He may hev been foolish and reckless and God knows what all, but, by theEtet- nal, he was white! Now, fellers, these yer letters, which I hev read to myself, are too sacred to be handed around or even read aloud. Some o' them's from his mother--a widow, I reckon--an' some's from/his sweet­ heart, an' if you'll agree to let me take care of 'em, I'M see that his folks get the news as gently as possi­ ble." He paused and looked around. There were no dissenting voices, so he resumed: "The nex' thing is to raise funds for a bang-up funeral." The old man, with his 'spectacles dimmed, picked up a battered hat from one of the bunks, dropped a five- dollar piece in it by way of a "starter," and then passed the hat around. The next issue of the local weekly briefly recorded the event tender the headline, "Shocking Death at Bocky Gulch." The woods claim their vic­ tims so often that but little attention 4s paid to an occurrence of this kind. But Josh could tell an eloquent story. -^-Aigonaut la Arksnu. An article in the Atlantic Monthly on "Plantation Life in Arkansas" is prodigal of rich and quaint sayings common among Arkansas "crackers." A sort of rude poetry shows in such phases as "mighty quick weather," for uncertuin weather, "burn the wind," to run fast, and "r*arin' and chargin'," a svnonym for fierce anger The roads are "only muddy shoe- mouth d(^ep,"or again they are muddy enough to "mire asaddle-blanket." "Come to git a fire?" the hostess demands of a visitor making a brief stay, alluding in hospitable sarcasm to old times, when matches were rare, and a neighbor might run -oyer to borrow a brand from the fire­ place. "Got your name in the pot,'? means that you are expected to a meal "I aint goin' to marry a wife won't work as in a col* collar," a man will say, having in mind the horses who will only when they are warmed by preliminary exercise. Cattle arc shut up to "gentle t^em." A housewife will say that hei- boiling water "aint kicking yet," or "iskick ing," according as it bubbles or not. The "all overs" is a striking name fomervousness, and somehow a "flti fled sheep" seems more to be pitied than a sheep liable to fits. " -- » • •* Bat %tm« to RieoMlla ill* .Pruden of the Icle*. About forty years ago women got tired of miocftig about the streets in slippers and began to wear sensible shoes with heels to them. The Innovation gave a considerable Shock to all that was ' 'proper." Heels were ihasculine. Ifor a woman to we^i- them seemed "bold," if not posi­ tively lift womanly. It was difficult for the objectors to assign any satis­ factory reason why a convenient leather heel to a shoe should not be worn by a woman as well as by a man, but conservatism does not hold itself bound to furnish reasons. Following the heel came an im­ provement in woman's walk. They learned to keep step when walking arm In arm with men. COnservatite propriety* which had by that time ac- custemed itself to heels, was perfectly certain that the new "stride" was un­ ladylike, and was disposed to think it immddbst. ' 1 These reminiscences are samples of history. Every man of middle age can easily multiply instances of a similar kind from which it is safe to draw this generalization, that when­ ever women begin to do anything which has previously been done only by men it seems to the average con­ ventional mind improper, unladylike and even immodest. It has been so with every sensible change in women's dress which has in any degree as­ similated it to the masculine costume. It has especially been so with every incursion of women into the domain of outdoor sport. In every instance use has quickly cured the shock to propriety, and that has soon come to seem proper enough which at first seemed so grossly im­ proper. Probably it will be so with t le new feminine practice of riding the bicycle. At present it shocks a considerable part of the community, and gave prel­ ates are preaching against it and is­ suing ecclesiastical bulls of one kind and another for its suppression. Yet if one observes a woman on a bicycle, any morning in the park he finds it impossible to suggest my good reason why she should not seek pleasure and health in that way. Her person is as well protected as in walking or riding on horseback, and much better pro­ tected than it is at dinner or in the german. . The fault with her costume is not that it is immodest, but rather that it errs in the opposite direction, sacrificing convenience and grace to Conventional and irrational ideas of what propriety requires. Women's greatest need is of occupa-1 tion, and especially healthful outdoor occupation for leisure hours. The bicycle offers this, and women should be free to avail themselves of the op­ portunity without encountering criti­ cism. • • - But they ought to have the courage of their athleticism. They ought to devise and wear on tbeir wheels a costume which will make their riding free, graceful and exhilarting in its fullest measure. J " In this, as in most things, our girls are all right, and conservatism had better let them alone. > : THE oldest Inhabitant is usually man* but the acoldest ia »1routai| W9 drink. The apparatus upon which thev are freshened is, in the majority of instances, merely a wooden plat­ form or "float" set in the bank of the creek, or other stream selected for the purpose, in such a manner that the water will wash over it from sluiceways, which are opened at low tide. In some localities quite elaborate platforms are constructed upon piling, at a proper level below high water mark. A light shed, of varying di­ mensions, is built over this, and a canal large enough to admit the pas­ sage ef a small boat, is dug on one side of the shed. On the other side of the structure are floors or stages above the reach of the water, where the bivalves are piled after freshen­ ing and then packed for shipment. When the tide goes down the oysters are left upon the platform inside the shed with a shallow covering of water, which is kept from escaping by aboard about ten inches in depth, placed at the end of the shed nearest the water. By means of cleverly arranged sluices, the fresh water is admitted, the oys­ ters open, and all the mud and other impurities escape. Generaly speak­ ing, they are sufficiently freshened in the course of three or four hours-- sometimes a shorter time suffices. This change of water improves their color, making it a purer white, and their forms assume thot appetizing plumpness so dear to the heart of an epicure. The ordinary individual imagines that this bloated appearance is an indication of an increase in the substance and weight of an oyster, but in reality it is merely a puffing up that naturally follows the change from their usual beverage of salt water, that element having a ten­ dency to shrivel them up, as it does one's hands or feet. • IVaternpuuti. r > ft haii frequently been asserted that a waterspout can be broken and destroyed by firing a cannon-ball through it, but this is not the opin­ ion of Prof. Cleveland Abbe, who saw many waterspouts during the United States scientific expedition to West Africa in 1889/ He did not try to shoot one, but from his study of their manner of formation and appearance, he con­ cluded that a cannon-shot would not be likely to have much effect upon them. Waterspouts appear to take the.ir rise at the edge of a rain-squall where there is an ascending current of air. They are essentially small tornadoes, and it has been observed that a tor­ nado in passing across a lake assumes the characteristic appearance--a waterspout. There are two principal phenomena In a waterspout, tbe cup and the spout. The cup is a ^saucer-shaped mass of spray and water on the sur­ face of the ocean, just under the place where the spout appears to be let down from above. Sometimes the spray rises to a height of a hundred feet or more. The spout Is the most singular part of the spectacle. According to Prof. Abbe's recently published observa­ tions, it assumes the appearance of a rapidly whirling "axial cloud" stretch­ ing downward "by spasmodic efforts" from the lower surface of the general cloud above it. It increases its length gradually until it reaches the spray, and then begins retreating, forming and re-forming several times. Some­ times a swirling and bending tube is formed, reaching from the clouds to the sea and remaining for several minutes and at other time^the effort to form a spout proves a failure. The most striking thing in Prof. Abbe's reports is his description of an "exceedingly fine axial line" which generally preceded the shooting down­ ward of the tubutar cloud in the waterspouts that he saw, and the ap­ pearance of which "was very similar to that of the sting of a bee protrud­ ing from its sheath.'? The downward stretching of the waterspout is probably to be ascribed, like the similar appearance of the funnel of a tornado» to the rapid con­ densation of moisture in a swiftly as­ cending current of air. There is not much danger to be feared from an encounter with a waterspout except by small vessels. In fact, there is at least one instance ^ri record in Which a waterspout passed over a ship, the only damage done being the deluging of the deck with water. The spouts are only a few yards--often only a few feet--in liameter, although their height may beaquaiter of a mile or jpagre.-- Youth's Companion. ^ Preparing the Oyster tor M«Mti Oysters, as is probably well known, ire dfenizens of salt water, and when first caught are not possessed of that toothsome flavor that makes them so attractive to the majority of mankind. To render them fit for th&=£ons4imers they are first picked over, sorted out ind freed from the mud and slimy de­ posits that cling to them after being removed from their beds. Then they ,*r® piwed. .f«ra lew hours in water A Hurled People. On the side of the canon where the sun rarely shines were a number of burial caves, writes Dr. Lumholtz in Scribner's. At fi/st sight there was nothing to indicate that thev had ever been used, but after digging to a depth of three feet below the hard substance that composed the floor of the cave we fortunately struck a skull, then came upon the whole body of a man. After this followed that of a mother holding her child in her arms, and then two more bodies, all lying on their left sides facing the west, with their knees half drawn up, and all in a marvelous state of preserva­ tion owing to the presence of salt­ peter in the dust. This imparted to the dead a mummy-like appearance. Their features were very well pre­ served; some had retained their eye­ brows and part of their hair, and even their intestines had not all disap­ peared. The hair of these people was very slightly wavy and softer than that of the modern Indian--almost silky in fact. They were of low stature, and bear a marked resemblance to the Moqui village Indians, who, as well as the Zunis have a tradition that their ancestors Came from the South, and who to this day speak of their south­ ern brethren. I afterward brought to light sev- eral/nore bodies which had been in­ terred under similar conditions. They wore no ornaments of metal, but ornamental shells, and round their ankles and wrists were found anklets and bracelets of beautifully plaited straw, which, however, crum­ bled to dust when handled. Their only clothing consisted of three layers of wrappings wound around the loins; first came a coarse cotton cloth, then a piece of matting, and over that again another cloth wrapping. Un­ derneath was a large piece of cotton batting, mixed with the feathers of the turkey and the large woodpecker. In a few instances the cotton cloth was dyed red or indigo blue. Near the head of each body was a small olla" jar of simple design; and buried with one we found a bundle of "devil's claws" (marthynia). Telegraphera* Telegraphers' stories are unique sometimes, and they do not hesitate to tell them to one another. It is said that the operators in New Haven, having always lived there, seldom hear anything beyond the limits of the city and their operating rooms. The fact was illustrated recently, ac­ cording to the Telegraph Age, when an operator in New York remarked to the man he was working with in New Haven that Parnell had just died. "Who?" was the inquiry. "Parnell," was the reply. After a shor^ interval, during which, it ii? supposed, the New Haven operator was in conference with somebody, this message was sent: "If you mean P. T. Barnum, we heard that long ago, but no one knows who Parnem is." Another story frOm the same source relates to a farmer who entered an efflce in Central New York and sent this message to a woman in Canada: "Will you be illy wife? Please an­ swer quick by* telegraph." Although he waited the rest of the day he got no answer, but the next morning he got a night dispatch, sent collect, but favorable. The operator in express­ ing his sympathy said: "Little rough to keep you in suspense so long." "Look-a-hear, sonny," the farmer remarked, "I'll stand all the sus- pense. Any woman that'll hold back her answer all day to a proposal of marriage, jest so she kin send it half rate at night, is economical enough to make up after I get her for all the loss of time and injury to feelin's I've suffered waitin'!" Useful Ten Month* In the Year. The Rainy Day Club, which the womfen of Tacoma organized recently with the object of encouraging the wearing of ankle-hisrh dresses in wet weather in the interests of comfort and cleanliness, isfinding imitators in various cities of that region. There is a Wet Weather Club of women in Olympia, and anotheris being formed in Aberdeen. As the French View It. The Paris Figaro has heard of ||»e Chicago Fair and has heard disturb­ ing news of it. Figaro says: "One of the great attractions of the Chicago Exposition will be, it seems, an or­ chestra of 400 pianos arranged in a pyramid and played by a single pian­ ist. By the use of an electrical con­ trivance these 400 pianos will sound all together. Oh! mr head, my head!" ft Ham Been MariiritjUHl Sort* 4lHMi4»rt»ta, 'la All Staee Shapes. Perhaps no manufactured article has so variously adapted itself to cir­ cumstances as the sword. • I has been made of stone, wood, bone,, copper, brass, bronze and iron. It has as­ sumed many shapes and sizes; it has been long and short, wide and nar­ row, curved and straight, heavy and light, pointed round and square, sharp Dn one side, on both sides and on neither side. It has been put to many and various uses. The names applied to the sword are more numer­ ous than the shapes of the weapon it­ self. A collection of them as found in some of the museums of Europe is made up of a th&usand and Dne different kinds, with their pecu­ liar varyings of blades, handle pom­ mel, spindle, and hilt. They have been gathered from everywhere--the battlefield, the buried cltv, the tem­ ple, the sepulchers, the cave, and even the lake and river bed. In these museums may be seen the curt Greek sword; the Eoman weapon of as many lengths as the different countries it had conquered; the soft, pliant Gaelic blade; the hooked scim- eter of the Turk with an inside edge, and the curved Arab yataghan with the edge outside: the cross-handled sword of the crusader, with which he prayed and slew alternately; the Ma­ lay kriss; the notched blade of Zanzi­ bar she espada of the Spanish mata- 3ore; the glaive of the red-clothed headsman of the Middle Ages; the eighteenth century court sword; the schiavona of Venice; the Turkish kandjar; the Kabyle flissa; the Al­ banian cutlass, and the claymore "of Scotland. Scabbards, too, have been of all sizes and shapes, almost un­ countable. As men in early times fought hand to hand, the oldest specimens of the sword are short; in fact, the sword is probable but an evolution of the club, which at first, made of hard wood, was gradually sharpened on one and then on both sides, so as to inflict a nfore deadly wound. Even to-day we find some savage races employing wooden weapons. Wood gave way to stone which in turn was displaced by bronze, iron, and finally steel. The sword increased in length as men became more civilized and showed a disposition to fight farther away each other, which required more dex1 terity in the use of the weapon. Some specimens we have of swords of the Middie Ages are almost if not quite as long as the warriors that wielded them. During the fifteenth century the science of fencing was invented, when the sword in the form a rapier reached the highest point Of develop­ ment; At present the sword in any form is seldom employed in warfare. Neither the sabre of the cavalryman nor the cutlass of the sailor is used to any extent. Cavalry charges are sel­ dom made, and there is very little room for the old-time custom of board­ ing men-of-war and engaging the enemy hand-to-hand on the decks of Dur new and wondrously-armed iron­ clads. The sword in naval warfare has given way to the gigantic steel ram by which one vessel goes crash­ ing into another. The ram may be the more terrific and deadly in its work, but the hand-to-hand cutlass tight of the'last century is by far the more picturesque and thrilling--to the general reader. £>enseft. The art of making spectacles, says the Popular Science Monthly, has been reduced to a science. The bit of ?lass to be formed into a lens is fast­ ened by means of pitch to a small block of hard rubber so that it may be mc^e readily handled. It is ground by beirig Dressed against a rapidly re­ volving metal tool, whose curvative is equal and opposite to that desired in the lens. This known as the "rough tool" and is made of cast iron. It is mounted on a verticle spindle, and is kept moistened with emery and water. Several grades of emery are used in succession, changing from coarse to fine as the grinding pro­ ceeds. As a result of this process, the glass has a rough surface and is no longer transparent. It is now transferred to the "fine tool." This is made of brass and has its surface as true as possible. It is compared from time to time with a standard curve in order to insure accuracy. In this second grinding the abrading mate­ rials is rouge (carefully calcined sul­ phate of iron.) Finally the lens is polished by being pressed against a piece of cloth powdered with rouge and fastened \\ ith the rotating tool. The glass is now loosened from its block, turned over, and the reverse side of the lens is ground. When this has been accomplished the lens must be cut down to the proper shape for mounting in the.spectacle frame. It is placed on a leather cushion and held firmly in position by a rubbef- tipped arm while a diamond glass- cutter passing around an oval guide traces a similar oval on the glass beloW. The superfluous glass outside the oval is removed by steel pincers, the rough edges are ground smooth on Scotch wheels and the lens is ready for mounting. The glasses for small telescopes, microscopes, burn­ ing glasses and the like are ground in the same fashion. Thev Ought to Be Taken Oft A sealing schooner that stopped at Dne of the villages of the Attu Island, the most westerly of the Aleutian ?roup in the North Pacific Ocean, was able recently to .give a little re­ lief to the suffering natives, number­ ing about 150. Several years ago it was a great place for sea otters, and when a fur company established a trading post there many Aleuts were attracted to the island, but when the company moved its store the natives were left there. The island is bar­ ren, and the native must live on fish und sea lions, but as they have neither boats nor hunting outfits the supply is small. They make clothing from anything they can get, being thankful for gunny bags that may be 'eft by vessels that pass occasionally. Dne woman was found who had been jn her back for three years on ac- :ount of a broken leg, the bone not having been set. The Indians cannot ;et away, and must soon perish unless relief be sent. A SWEEPING victory--When you ;et the servant to handle the broom iTfli LUMBER CAM! "*«l«e V«Mimn Leails-' and * Healthy Lib. The houses are nearly all banked. the coal and wood for Wintcf &e in the shed or cellar, and th» family 8UD- plies for several jority of the people of IKtstern Maine are ready to stand the siege which winter is now preparing to give; and with mills shut down and vessels away or hauled up beyond danger, there c is little for a laboring man to do unless he goes into the woods. He can work on the ice, to be sure, when the cutting begins, but that will not be for several weeks and perhaps not until February, so it Is better few many men to get steady work and board at small pay than it is to wait soflong; and between the woods oi odd-jobs around home the choice /i§ always made for the woods. Let the high-collared dudes talk as they may about the coarse fare, coarse company and coarse clot hing that an common in the woods, there is a pleasure and an abandon in a lumber­ man's qamp that can be found no­ where else in the world. In the flnrt place a lumber camp comes the near­ est to being a perfect republic of anj society in the world. Living, work­ ing, eating and sleeping together fci day after day and week after week, with no communication with the out­ side world save an occasional messen­ ger who comes like a bit of sea-wreck to those happy Robinson Crusoes, every man comes to consider every other man his equal, and the frateriutf feeling here engendered, like that bl army experiences, usually extends through life. Quarrels and bitter dis­ putes, such as are common in country and town, are almost unknown hfer& If one of the number happens to have an acrid disposition he is ostracised, by the whole camp, and allowed to meditate upon his folly until contem­ plation shall have cured him of hi& faults. Men who are addicted to coarse and brutal language become molifled and made kinder from asso­ ciation with those who are of finer grain, and gradually the whole life ol the camp is elevated to a standard that will compare favorably with the average civilization of the State, hat a chance life in the woods it animals in the winter. Thert the bea*k hides away in leaves or undei windfall^; the coon finds a hollow tree and sleeps away the cold dayg and nights with the resinous pine wood for a coverlid; the woodchuck curls himself up in dry knolls far be­ low the frost and burns the fuel he has accumulated during the summer for heat; the little chipmunk takes his wife into a dry, airy earthen chamber, and there they live on beechnuts, and acorns regardless of deep snows or blustering winds, and the freckled, crawling caterpillar that fed upon green leaves and herbage when it was a worm, spins for himself a silken blanket and wraps his body therein, safe away under bark and moss in a chamber more richly furnished than any king or prince that ever ruled. Meanwhile the hawl^s and wood- peckers and chickadees flit here and there among the limbs and trunks, of trees seeking food and pleasure where- ever they may be found; the beavers and muskrats build houses that will reach above the highest floods, and from bark and grass roots find pala­ table meals; the mink and otter and fisher cat and lynx hunt day and night for game, regardless of laws oi game wardens, and moose and deer and caribou dig in the snow for grass, eat moss and pendant limbs, or browse greedily upon twigs and evergreens. And whatever mammal or bird does the woodsman knows it. There is no fooling him. Men mav pay short visits to the woods, catch brief glimpses of the scenery and go home and write books and books upon the habits of plants and animals, but the lumberman knows more than booke and more than book-makers. The life and habits of those who surround him are his books. In these he studies day and night, and yet so great is the lesson that though he apply himseli for years the whole is never learned. Another blessing of wood life is that sickness and poor appetites are prac­ tically unknown there. The food is not dainty; but it is clean and well cooked, antl the exercise of the work, coupled with the climate and air, gives a sharp appetite, which in turn brings good digestion, sound sleep and health. It would be far better than drugs and doctors' medicine for hun­ dreds of the sickly, dyspeptic clerks in big cities, if they were to drop pencil and yard stick and betake themselves to the woods of Maine for. one winter and live on pork and £>eans and bread and inolasses, drinking their scalding tea from tin dippers and get up a circulation by exercise and leading a regular life. . In times to come the great summer sanitarium where invalids go todrink mineral water and take medicated baths will give way to the winter sanitariums of the Maine woods, and to these resorts more of the sickly and listless shall come every year, until wood chopping shall be a means of prolonging life, and millionaires' sou shall crowd out all poor people from the privilege.--Bangor News. A Siiattarltuai tot Mtonf, . ejre are a number of other people,* most of them of no particular note, | awaiting the expiration of their three ,J months' time. I have asked how | many divorces there are in the place, i Some say sixty, others say over a ban* 4red. There is a plan on foot here to build next season a son of co-opwa- I tive sanitarium, or something of the iort, for divorcees alone, where there J will be handsome suites of rooms, with baths, fine grounds, all modern ^ improve me uts, a physician, and, it is % needless to say, a lawyer in constant -l attendance. I was driven out the i 3ther day and shown the site of the proposed hotel, but as yet there is nothing but the site there, with some i? mineral springs which it is proposed * to turn to the benefit of the suffering- 1 matrimonial misfits. Fancy ringing for a lawyer as yon would for a bell-boy, and saying; "Bring me up a divorce, please," as '-4 fou would order a pitcherof ice water. --Sioux Falls Letter in New York i :-i sew* mm*