The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

" f "~ '•" " *• T r , d.'. iiaff?-'C L. Si, -trr ^,, PLUM fc + * * * * # ' A *» x V { 1'4 AVhmtr mnAtrAM CHAPTER I. ^A< How It All Began. "W® can hold out six months long- ', «*--at least six months." My moth­ er's tone made the six month® atretch encouragingly into six long ,jnsars. ;•/... I see her now vividly asif it were (Only yesterday. We w< -e at. our scant tareakfast, I as blue aa was eve? *;-\^,'#ren 25, she brave and confident. -And hers was mo mere pretense to , ' reassure me, no cheerless optimism ^ ignorance, hat th© through-a&d- trough courage and strength of those :%ho flinch for no bogey that life or Her tone lifted death. can conjure. i»«; I glanced at her and what shone frotn her eyes set me on my feet, face j my agents, high and low, have always " been sugar-coated as "suggestions"--- and nature had been conouered and before the big world's arteries of thought and action had penetrated. The farmers took eagerly to litigation to save themselves from stagnation. Still, a new lawyer, especially if he was young, had an agonizing time of it convincing their slow, stiff, suspi­ cious natures that he could be trust­ ed !a such a crisis as "going to law." • To mak® matters worse, I foil ia lova. Once--It was years afterward, though not many years ago--BurbaTik, at the time governor,, was with me, and we were going over the main points for his annual message. One of my suggestions--my orders tc all i Pffc the foe. The table-cloth was darn- fa in many places, but so skillfully '{hat you could have looked closely Without detecting it. Not a lump of jmgar, nor a slice of bread went to • Waste in that house; yet even* I had to think twice to realize that we were Door, desperately poor. She did not bide our poverty; she beautified it, «he dignified it into Spartan sim- ^fflicity. I know it is not the glamour •' 'ovfer the past that makes me be­ lieve there are no women now like fhose of the race to wbich she be­ longed. The world, to-day, yields Comfort too easily to the capable; ^^ardshlp is the only mold for such " Character,, and in those days, in this > |u iddle-western country, even the cap- u able were strangers to hardship. CV • "When I was young," she went on, \' Ct ^'and things looked black, , as they have a habit of looking to the young find Inexperienced,"--that put in with -* ^a teasing smile at me--"I used to say , ' * 'fo myself: "Well, anyhow, they can't r|ciU me," And the thought used to heer me up wonderfully. In fact, It ptill does." ; ( ... I no longer felt hopelttBS. I began gnaw my troubles again--despair if till. Judge Granby is a dog," said I; yes, a dog." "Why 'dogT" objected my mother. ~*4|'Why not simply 'mean man?' I've ' ,.; . '^ovcr known n dog that could equal man who set out to be 'ornery.'" f -m "When I think of all the work I've !V , %one for him in thele three years--" ,!?&*•* "For yourself," she interrupted, >".',;).*Work you do for others doesn't * fimount to much, unless it's been first , |md best for yourself." • . . "But he was benefited by it, too," *4$ urged, "and has taken life easy, and $^Pas had more clients and bigger fees •V T.^^haifcJte ever had before. I'd like to ^-^Tp&e % a jolt. I'd stop nagging to Jfcit my name in a miserable • ,s ̂ corner oft the glass in his door. I'd S.iiang out a big sign of |ny own over PsJ^i^ny own offlqe door" ' S .. < My mother burst into a radiant .j^lsmile. "I've been waiting ft year#to X liear that," she said, 'v'f, Thereupon I had a shock of fright '^r--inside, for I'd never have dared to r/?s. «how fear before toy mother. There's .Nothing else that makes you so brave ' «jas living with some one before whom Syou haven't the courage to. let your t" ; r'cowardice show its feather. If we y.f' ilidn't keep each other up to the mark, ;V,\ .What a spectacle of fright and 'flight -this world-drama would be! Vanity, ';tN , Tthe greatest of vices, is also the 'if/ /^greatest of virtues, or the source of -the greatest virtues---which comes to C the same thing. S-- % "When did you do it?" she went on, pv , .f land then I knew I was in for it, and ,i~lp <-)iow well-founded was the suspicion '^#\'jthat had been keeping my lips tight- «•'\ehut upon my dream of independ- '.' Sence. i "I'll--I'll think about it," was my answer, in a tone which I hoped she would see was not hesitating, but re­ flective; '*1 mustn't go too far--or too fast." "Better go too far and too fast than none at all," retorted my wise mother. "Once a tortoise beat a hare --once. It never happened again, yet the whole timid world has been talk­ ing about it ever since." And she fell into a study frost whir.ii «hA roused herself to say: "You'd better "21 et me bargain for the office and the ^furniture--and the big sign." She - ajknew--but could not or would not V-; 'y'teach me--how to get a dollar's worth % ' «or a dollar; would not, I suspect, for .j: . $he despised parsimony, declaring it. be another virtue which is beeom- "p*ng only in a woman. 1 "Of course--when--" I began. I "We've got to do something in the \linext six months," she warned. And jnow she made the six months seem : . bix minutes. about the danger of dragging ^ Iher down into misfortune; but before ^ " "5ppeaking. I looked at her, and, look- • jtl ,:ine. refratnwl To BO* FT hor WOULD iViN^have. been too absurd--to her who it" V^had been left a widow with nothing i ' ^%t all, who had educated me for col- .'j2 ;'^ege' and who had helped me through f-Jmy first year there--helped me with -money, I mean. But for what she , "M' «ave besides, more, immeasurably k "more--but for her courage in me and >s\ /round me and under me---I'd never ffhave got my degree or anything else, To caip^hat courage help ;•#? r'ft said I, with a laugh which sounded so brave tkat* fet aitraî itwajr ttatte me : • V- So it was settled. v. But that was the first step ̂ in a , ' l J light I can't remember even no* with- 'L Aont a sinking heart. The farmers • ..of Jackson county, of which Pulaski m i was the county seat, found in litlga- _||tIon their chief distraction from the ; stupefying dullness of farm life in ei pftuuN ̂after- 4he ladiaa started a new train of thought in him, and he took pen and paper to fix it before it had a chance to escape. As he wrote, my glance wandered along the shelves of the book-cases. It paused on the farthest and lowest shelf. I rose and went there, and found my old school-books, those I used when I was in public school No. 3, too, near 30 years ago! In the shelf ana boek Mood higher jo go to see her was lia|to«8|ble; how could the money be spaarod-~$50 at the least? Once--when the|;||ft|>een goiil »hout four months--my" 'mother touted that I must But I refused, aid I do not know whether it .is to my credit or not, for my refusal gave her only pain, whereas the sacrifices she would have had to make, had I gone, Would have given her only pleasure. I had *s© fear that .Betty 'chsage lis ©ur separation, There are some people you hope are stanch, Mid some peaple you think will be stanch, if--, and then there are those, many women and a few men, whom it is impossible to think of as false or even faltering. 1 did not fully appreciate that quality then, for my memory was not then dotted with the graves of false friendships and littered with the rubbish of broken promises; but I did appreciate it enough to build securely upon it. Build? No, that is not the word. There may be those who are stimu­ lated to achievement by being in love, though I doubt it. At any rate, I was not one of them. My love for her absorbed my thoughts, and par­ alyzed my courage. Of the qualities that have contributed to what success I may have had, I pot in the first rank a disposition to see the gloom­ iest nide of the future. But it has not helped 4o make my life happier, invaluable though it has been in pre­ venting misadventure from catching me napping. So another year passed. Then came hard times--real hard times. I had some clients--enough to insure mother and myself a living, with the interest on mortgage and note kept down. But my clients were poor, and poor pay, and slow pay. Nobody was doing well but the note-shavers. I-- How mother fought to keep the front brave and bright!--not her front, for that was bright by nature, like the sky beyond the clouds; but our front, my front--the front ̂ m* a£alr*> > fr^' \ 8 3r\ Better Let Me Bargain for tha Furniture and tha Big Sign. than the other--tall and thin and ragged, its covers torn, its pages scribbled, Btalned and dog-eared. Looking through that old physical ge­ ography was like a first talk with a long-lost friend. It had, indeed, been my old friend. Behind its broad back I had eaten forbidden apples, I had aimed and discharged the blow- gun, I had reveled in blood-and-thun- der tales that made the drowsy schoolroom fade before the vast wil­ derness, the scene of breathless strug­ gles between Indian and settler, or open into the high seas where pirate, er worse-than-pirate Britisher, struck flag to American privateer or man- o'-war. On an impulse shot up from the dustiest depths of memory, I turned the old geography sidewlse and ex­ amined the edges of the cover. Yes, there was the cache I had made by splitting the pasteboard with my jack- knife. I thrust In my finger-nail; out came a slip of paper. I glanced at Burbank--he was busy. I, somewhat No one must see that ^nre were pinch­ ing--so I must be the most obviously prosperous young lawyer in Pulaski. What that struggle cost her I did not then realize; no, could not realize un­ til I looked at her face for the last time, looked and turned away and thought on the meaning of the lines and the hollows over which Death had spread his proclamation of eter­ nal peace. I have heard it said of those markings in human faces: "How ugly!" But it seems to me that, to any one with eyes and imagination, line and wrinkle and hollow always have the somber grandeur of tragedy. I remember my mother when her face was smooth and had the shallow beauty that the shallow dote on. But her face whereon was writ­ ten the story of fearlessness, sacri­ fice and love--that is the face beauti­ ful of my mother for me. In the midst of those times of trial, when she had ceased to smile--for she had none of that hypocritical cheerfulness which depresses and is stealthily, vnii may Imagine, opened i a mew v»nlty to *n®ke silly on!«ok«m the paper and--well, my heart beat | cry "Brave!" when there is no true more rapidly as I saw In a school-girl bravery--just when we were at our scrawl: I was no longer master of a state; I was a boy in school again. I could see her laboring over this game of "friendship, love, indifference, hate." I could see "Redney" Griggs, who sat between her and me, in the row of desks between and parallel to my row and hers--could see him swoop and snatch the paper from her, look at it, grin maliciously, and toss it over to mA I was in grade A. was Ifi. and was beginning to take myself se­ riously. She was in grade D, was lit­ tle more than half my age, but looked, older--and how sweet and pretty she was! She had black hair, thick and wavy, with little tresses escaping from plaits and ribbons to float about her forehead, ears and neck. Her ftkjn was darker then, I think, than it is now, but It had the same smoothness and glow--certainly ft could not have had more. I think the dart must have struck •fra* day--why else did I keep the bit of paper? But it did not trouble me until the first winter of my launch­ ing forth as "Harvey Sayler, Attorney and Counselor at Law." She was the daughter of the Episcopal preach­ er; and, as every one thought well of the prospects of my mother's son, our courtship was undisturbed. Then, in the spring, when fortune was at its coldest and love at its most feverish, her father accepted a call to a church ia Boston, eight »Ues aw«? lowest ebb, came an offer from Bill Dominick to put me into politics. I had been interested in politics ever since I was seven years old. I recall distinctly the beginning: On a November afternoon--it must have been November, though I r» member that It was summer-warm, with all the windows open and many men in the streets in shirt-sleeves-- lit any rate, I was on my way home from school. As I neared the court house I saw a crowd in the yard, and waa reminded that it was election day, and that my father was running for reelection to the state senate; so, I bolted for his law office In the sec­ ond story of the Masonic temple, ar.ros* the street from -the . court house.. He - was at the window and was looking at the polling place so intent­ ly that he took no notice of me as I stood beside him. I know now why he was absorbed and why his face was stern and sad. I shut my eyes and see that court house yard, the long line of men going to vote, single file, each man calling out his name as he handed in his ballot, and Tow Weed- on--who shot an escaping prisoner when he was deputy sheriff--repeat­ ing the name in a loud voice. Each oncoming voter in that curiously reg­ ular and compact file was holding out his right arm stiff so that the band was about a foot clear of the thigh; and in every one of those thus con­ spicuous hands was a conspicuous bit of white paper--a ballot. As each man reached the polling window and ghve his name, he swung that hand round with a stiff armed, circular mo­ tion that kept it clear of the body and in full view until the bit of pa­ per disappeared in tbe slit in the bal­ lot box. I wished to ask my father What this strange spectacle meant; but, as I glanced up at him to begin my ques­ tion, I knew I must not, for I felt that I was seeing something which shocked him so profoundly that he would take me away if I reminded hiilt of my presence. I know now that I was witnessing the crude be­ ginnings of the money-machine in pol­ itics--the beginnings of the downfall of parties--the beginnings of the over­ throw of the people as the political power. Those stiff-armed men were the "floating voters" of that ward of Pulaski. They had been bought up by a rich candidate of the opposi­ tion part.", which was less scrupulous than our party, then in the flush of devotion to "principles" and led by such old-fashioned men as my father with old-fashioned notions of honor and honesty. Those "floaters" had to keep the ballot in full view from the time they got it of the agent of their purchaser until they had deposited It beyond the possibility of substitution --he must see them "deliver the goods." My father was defeated. He saw that, in politics, the day of the public servant of public interests was over, and that the night of the private Bervant of private Interests had be­ gun. He resigned his leadership into the dextrous hands of a politician. Soon afterward he died, muttering: "Prosperity has ruined my country." From that election day my inter­ est in politics grew, and but for my mother's bitter prejudice I^hould have been an active politician, perhaps be­ fore I was out of college. Pulaski, indeed all that section of my state, was strong of my party. Therefore Dominick, its local boss, was absolute. At the last county election, four years before the time of which I am writing, there had been a spasmodic attempt to oust him. He had grown so insolent, and had put his prices for political and political- commercial "favors" to our leading citizens ao high, that the "best ele­ ment" in our party reluctantly broke from Its allegiance. To save himself he had been forced to order flagrant cheating on the tally sheets; his ally and fellow conspirator, M'Coskrey, the opposition boss, was caught and was indicted by the grand jury. The reformers made such a stir that Ben Cass, the county prosecutor, though a Dominick man, disobeyed his mas­ ter and tried and convicted M'Cbsk- rery. Of course, following the cus­ tom in cases of yielding to pressure from public sentiment, he made the trial-errors necessary to insure re­ versal in the ̂ higher court; and he finally gave Dominick's judge the op­ portunity to quash the indictment. But the boss was relentless--Cass had been disobedient, and had put upon "my friend M'Coskrey" the dis­ grace of making a sorry figure In court. "Ben can look to his swell reform friends for a renomi nation," said he; "he'll not get it from me." Thus it came to pass that Domin­ ick's lieutenant, Buck Fessenden, ap­ peared in my office one afternoon in July, and, after a brief parley, asked me how I'd like to be prosecuting at­ torney of Jackson county. Four thousand a year Cor four years, and a reelection if I should give satisfac­ tion; and afterward, the bench or seat in congress! I could pay off everything; I could marry! It was my first distinct virion of the plum tree. To how many thou­ sands of our brightest, most promis­ ing young Americans it is shown each year in just such circumstances! (TO BJB CONTINUED.) iPIMSi -• <-• yi"4. ^ ^ j f . '" ; *•-v ' - v Is 8 i lb f . VJ. i *.£,4 - i; >• •. '•'A'TSS !>•' fie Big Fire Cracker /• The explosion that wound up the Fourth of July Celebration on Cooney Island. Two mammoth firecrackers stood in the window of Casey's grocery. They were 12 inches long and proportion­ ately thick. For a month before the Fourth of July these gigantic Indicators of en­ thusiasm had stood in the window like British soldiers on dress parade, while a predatory spider hung a filmy ham­ mock between them and calmly killed his buzzing victims over two powder mlneB. The firecrackers were the admira­ tion and the envy of all the boys in Cooney Island* It was seldom that a youthful nose was not flattened against the window pane in ardent covetous- ness. But the price demanded by Casey for the thunderers was prohibitive, so far as the boys were concerned, and there was not one of them patriotic or courageous enough to invest 25 cents in a single ecstatic explosion. Said Mickey Finli timidly one even­ ing when he had been sent by his mother to get a quarter of a pound of tea and half a pound of pork: "Mr. Casey, I suppose now, that whin yan o' thlm big fellows wlnt off it would blow the stars out of the rfky?" his mind filled with blissful thoughts of mighty explosions. Casey stopped measuring out.a half pint of New Orleans molasses, raised a monitor finger, and replied: "Micky, my boy, I'd be afeerd to tell you what would happen if I stood wan o' thim big fellows out on the Bide- walk and touched the stem wid the Jighted end of a five cent clga-ar. The noise would be terrible, terrible, my son. 'Twould make your head ring like an anvil, and you would see sparks like fireflies. "Would it blow the house down?" asked the boy in an awed whisper. "No, I don't think it would," said Casey. "it: might shake the cliitnly down and break all the glass in the Waa Not Wanted Just at that Time. £dltor Thought He Could Gat Along Without Article.| The story is told of a writer who, through boldness in attacking the es­ tablished order of things, had consid­ erable vogue for a short time. In the midst of his notoriety he decided that he would contribute to a certain well- known magazine, in whose pages he had not yet been represented. He waited on the editor, and found him immersed in some hurried writing. "Ah, Mr. Blank," said the author, with that immunity from modesty which distinguished him, "you want an arti­ cle from me." "Indeed?" queried the editor, going on with his writing. "Indeed?" "One article to begin with," pursued the author. "And I am will­ ing to do it for you in spite of much wnrir" "indeed?" said the' editor, as before. "I - should say," followed up the author, "that for such aji article as I have in mind, startling and orl ginal, I will close with ,you for $1,000." The editor's pen drove on. "Close with me!" he murmured. "Close! Will you kindly close the door as won go out?" When Father Is it. About the only procession "Father" ever heads is when the members of his family think they hear a burglar, in the dead of night, and push the poor little old man at the head of the procession that looks for the burglar. --Atchison Globe. [|\\r >c>X/0 " - - c, - - . ; Ardent Covetcu&iiess< windys In small pieces, and there would be paper in the streets as would fill an impty barrel o' flour. Oh, but thlm big fellows te mighty power­ ful, Micky, mighty powerful. They <use them in China to kill murderers and robbers. They put wan o' thim big firecrackers bechune the teeth of a mordeter and make him light the fuse wid his own hand and blow his own head off. Thlm Chinese is mighty crool, Mickey, mighty crool." This vivid description inflamed Mick­ ey's desire, which was Casey's motive in telling it, for the incident occurred on the eve of the Fourth, and Casey was afraid that the big firecrackers would be carried over the national hoi iday and remain a loss on his hands. In order to deepen the impression al ready made upon the boy Casey per­ mitted him to handle one of the twins. The boy's eyes had widened to their utmost capacity when he was outside the window, but now that he could feel the red jacket his hands trembled with the eagerness of pos­ session and he would have given ten years of his life to own it. "Take It along wid you, Mickey," said Casey, cajolingly. "Thim crack­ ers were made in Chow Ghow, in China, for the Cooney Island trade, and I Want to get rid of thim I have on hand before I send another order to Wan Lung, the haythin." "But I have no money," said Mick­ ey sorrowfully. "My father is goin' to give me three bunches of little, fire­ crackers and a pinwheel, but I know he wouldn't buy wan o' thim big fire­ crackers for me." "Well," continued Casey, "you come down here to-morrow mornin' and carry in a half ton of coal for me and ril give you the big cracker." The next morning Mickey was busy for two hours carrying chestnut coal in a nail keg and dumping it in Casey's cellar. Just after noon, with a smile covered with coal dust and a bosom full of chuckles, he received his prize. No grass grew under his bare feet as he ran homeward, the precious powder mine clasped to his bosom. Holding the big firecracker aldft as he darted through the kitchen door, he exclaimed: ' "Mother, X hava tit Ai&t tt a beauty?" "Well, I don't see anything about it to be makin' a fuss over," said Mrs. Finn, who, like most mothers, had no love for fireworks. "Now, don't be bringin' it nearer to me, as Mickey ran toward her. "I don't want to be blown Into the middle o* next week. Throw the dirty thing away! I'm afeeredV me life while you have it in your hands! Now, don't be goin' near the stove wid it! Arrah, ye little spalpeen, will ye take it off the stove? Take it off afore ye blow the roof off the house!" and the frightened woman ran into the bedroom and peered through the keyhole. With the recklessness of boyhood» Mickey exclaimed, as he lit a match and reduced his mother to hysterics by pretending to light the firecracker stem: "You needn't be afeered, mother. Til nip it out afore it goes off." In this simple fashion the afternoon of the Fourth passed away in the Finn household varied by the boy with oc­ casional visits to the neighbors, whom he threw into a panic of fear by pre­ tending to light the big explosive. Mrs. Murphy and her three children were gathered around the kitchen table when Mickey plaqed the lighted •ammoth in the middle of the table. wo of the boys went head first through the window, while Mrs. Mur­ phy tried to crawl under the kitchen stove. All this excitement afforded the boy a good deal of delight, but he re­ served for the evening the culmina­ tion of his joy. He Intended to blow !>is father UD as he sat in his chair on the back stoop. Mickey thought it would be an in­ spiring sight to witness his father fly- mg across the back yard and plow­ ing up the ground with his nose. In order that he might have an audience appropriate to so great an occasion, Mickey had spread the news among all the boys of the neighborhood, and at nine o'clock 50 boys sat on the fence surrounding the back yard. Mr. Finn, tired of the excitement of the day, had fallen asleep in his rocking chair on the back stoop, when Mickey lit the stem of the big cracker and placed it carefully under his father's chair. The moon shone brightly, illuminat­ ing the grin on every boyish face. Every ear was 3trained to catch tha faint hissing of the fuse and every eye intent upon the sleeping man. The fuse burned itself out, and tha sllfence and suspense was deepening. i Had Fallen Asleep. A minute passed and another, until Mickey could stand the strain no longi er. He reached down and lifted tha firecracker from beneath the chair. As be held it up in the moonlight to examine it, a mosquito lit upon his father's nose and the old gentleman awoke. Grabbing the firecracker from his son's hand he arose and holding it aloft, he said: , "Boys, there will be no explosion to-night. I'm sorry to disappoint you. I was afeered that Mickey might do some harrum wid that big cracker, so whin he wasn't lookin' this afternoon I took the powder out of it and nilea it wid clay. So, you see that the show is over, and ye may as well go home and go to bed. There'll be no more explosions only what I give Mickey wid a shingle afore I turn in. Good night to ye all. Come around some other night whin there is sometUa' doin'." FOURTH OF JULY DONT8. Don't allow the children too brad over fireworks which will not "go off.'* They sometimes do it unexpectedly with unfortunate results to the little meddler. • • • Don't neglect to send for a clan at once in the case of a serious burn, to prevent a possible scar or worse still, blood poisoning, from ig­ norant or improper treatment of the wound. • • • Don't forget to have some remedies for burns at hand. When the skin is not broken by a burn scrape a raw potato, place on a piece of, soft linen and use as a poultice. Bicarbonate of soda--the ordinary baking soda--is ex­ cellent for burns whether the skin is broken or not. If broken apply the dry soda, if unbroken dampen the soda with water to make a pasie and appi? (o the spot The pain will be instant­ ly relieved. * * « Don't leave the windows of a town house open if it is to be left for the day. Stray rockets and sparks aapfr find aa entrance. Good Advice. Keep the wound open and the doctor. FIRST MONEY JN CALIFORNIA. • j . A P o p r K i n d o f C i t i z e n . tt doesn't pay to put much faith la the man who has to keep up his cour- j age by thinking of people who fortunate than ha- Queer -Early, Coinage--D. O. Mills Is­ sued First Paper Money. Coins in California till the fall of 1856 were a queer kettle of fish. More than 60 per cent, of the silver and at least 26 per cent, of the gold was for­ eign. Most of the other gold coins were private coins. Mofflt & Co. got a per­ mit from the government to coin gold. Their coinage was confined to ten and 20 cents and were stamped "Mofflt & Co." We laid all kinds of doubloons and Similar South and Central Ameri­ can coins. Of the smaller gold coins the French 20-franc piece led all the others. The English guinea was fairly rap- resented. But it passed for only its face value, while the other gold passed for more. The 20-franc piece, value |3.75, went at four dollars. There was a still greater discrep­ ancy in the silver coins. A one-franc y j piece went for 25 cents, and the East j India rupee, value 45 cents, went for 50 cents; the five-franc piece one dol­ lar. The French silver represented about 60 per cent of the silver circu­ lation. ueriuBii tliWr uiaicia wOTui cents went at one dollar. Everything above !i0 cents was one dollar and everything above 25 cents was 50 cents. A French bank in San Fran­ cisco was said to have got rich ship­ ping French coin in exchange for gold dust. United States coin was scarcer until the mint was established. In the fall of 1856 the banks refused to take any foreign coins except at a heavy discount. The result was that in a few months all foreign coin disap­ peared. It proved a bonanza for the saloon people- They would give a drink for a franc, while the banks gave only 12 ^ cents. The saloon pro- pie gathered them and the rupees in at old prices and sold to the banka fo? bullion and made a good thing. But for a few years we suffered badly for silver change. Even uniil 1856 gold dust circulated to consid­ erable extent in mining districts. But tha scales were always used. There waa no paper money O. Mills * Co. issued their gold notes about 1858. En getting change for aa old octagon |50, gold, often as many as four or five nauoualities would be represented in the change. Greenbacks were never recognised • as money; only as a commodity. Tbey " fw were used for buying postage and rev- v ; ̂ enue stamps. All mercantile biB heads and notes had the special con- tract enforcement for gold. California even paid the claims of the federal * J,* government in gold. And it cam© in - J ' mighty handy to Uncle Sam in 1363 Jg. and 1863. The old-style California^ - < still has an inclining for tha jallOfV - 4 . th stuff.--P. EL Magazine. . " • Didn't Always Rcfusa, *Tve tried to discourage Mr. NervtS from calling on yon," auappad the stern parent, "hut the yowag seaa# refuses to be sat upon." "Why, father, you do him an injua-. tice," indignanuy replied tha dear girl.--Kansas City Times. What He Wants. Ji i.v ..<• ,.̂ .1 ,kv 'lu >' fit slSW sit!