and costumes equally white in effect! mode of living, for with the exception _... ered with straw and set aside to fer- 'nd occasionally men pass carrying 4 1@ Monotony and Decay That Char. oth acterize Corean Towns Are Outcome of Corruption That Dates: Away: Back Into Middle Ages--Japanese and Their Methods Are Not Wel- come, But Are Inevitable. Tho isolation which earned for Co- the name of the Hermit Kingdom 'has also preserved its peculiar cus- ttoms unchanged, In the costumes of 'tho people, which seem more suitable for a comic opera than practical use, tthe primitive construction of houses and the national customs Corea to- day is practically the Corea of a thousand years ago. ae 'To-day the traveler who crosses from Japan may land at the harbor of Fusan, because it has been select- ed as tho railroad centre of the coun-, try by the Japanese. The first im--- yression upon landing is the absolute' flack of any color. Southern Corea 13) practically destitute of trees. Its for-| ests were RAS as down, the story: < @ more easily to do. way with the country's former sbeourge, the tiger; more probably the eason was that the people needed, wood and with typical improvidence forgot to plan for the future. ' The impression of the country on nearing land is therefore of darkness,' 'the town itself adding only the gleam-! ing white of sandy, sun-baked streets ff not too closely examined, for the Coreans, men and women alike, save those of the upper classes, wear curi- ous white coiton garments consisting of long baggy trousers and a long coat of simple cut that 'closes with a bow, wear the right shoulder. For the marc- ried men the effect is made even more ridiculous by a black hat, narrow of . brim and high of crown, under which their long hair must be gathered in a knot. -. The appearance of Corean towns and cities, even of Seoul, the capital, is monotonous and depressing once the impression of universal and com- plete poverty, filth and decay has worn off. For though social distine- tions are said to be as strict in this country as they are in others they ave no outward expression in the f of court and king the nation lives in mud huts, usually of two rooms, cov- ered with straw. roofs and opening in the back on small yards or compounds surrounded by mud walls of varying | but formidable height. » Sanitation in spite of the efforts of | ° at the Five months later it was recognized | sae . : : ; : 5 | This is placed in a solution of lime the religious missions and the Japan- ese is practically non-existent; the | heating in winter is done in.a kang, | a stove similar to that of the Cht- nese, in which the fire is made under- meath the stone floor. It gives no warmth at all or makes the room un- endurably hot, besides being very dangerous. "The chimney is a hole in | 'the side of the house near the ground. In the compound domestic animals are kept if the family possesses any, and in one corner sunk into the round are the kimshi jars. Kimshi s the universal winter food, a pre- paration of cabbage, tomatoes, onions and red peppers tightly packed, cov- The older the mixture and tha Been. o™ stronger the odor the greater delicacy it is considered. ' The street picture increases the im- _ pression of a hopeless poverty against which the people have ceased to strug- lo. There is little activity. A few ox lrawn carts go slowly lumbering by -encrmous loads en their backs, for in Corea man is the commonest beast of Durden. The majority of tho population in various states of dress and undress' gre stretched out in the little spots of shade, sleeping, laughing or teas-, ing one another Idleness leads to: ecuffies here and there, but as a rule graceful lethargy prevails. Naked children play in the dirty sewer water which usually runs through a ditch fn the middle of the street. Every- where is indescribable filth and a calm acceptance of it. : The reason commonly given for the condition of this pauper kingdom is the official corruption, which is of uch ancient date that it has almos become honorable. From the king to the lowest man in authority stealing, or squeezing as it is ealled in the ast, was the common means of exist- - pnee, openly carried on. If any citi- | gon built a house, owned property, or ghowed other indication of moans he or one of his relatives was promptly » 4mprisoned and the family was fore- ed to ransom him. + What the official etole from the peo- le the courtier took from his inferior and the king helped himself univer- -gally. When the people had nothing Jeft the king sold to wealthy nobles @ right to coin money, which they | made the most of by using any in- ferior metal and by eontinuing even after the right had expired. The coun- | try was soon so full of debased coins that at one port there were quotations - gurrent in 1901 for ()1 Government nickels; (2) first-class counterfeits; (3) medium ciass counterfeits, and (4) counterfeits so poor as to be passable only after dark. ~ The result of this system was that all manner of work was discouraged | nntil labor fel into diseredit. Why amass wealth that would surely be stolen? One class copied the lesson ef idleness from its superiors with, the resalt that even the poorest and Jowliest citizen considered labor be- noath him. The Coreans can make no effective opposition to the Japanese, for pover: ty, lack of arms and organization : ke their efforis useless against the -Jarge and well-train Japanese army, against Japanese superiority as a race and Japanese advantages of experi ence and training in matters. political and gocial. see concn gene tema om d Grass Matches. A stff grass which is grown abun: dantly in India is used for sticks fa waking watches im that country. -- PO cement nene a" : Truth Will Out. , ' Wubby (vith Irritationy--Why is it 'that you women insist upon having the last word? Wifey (calmly)--We don't. The only reason we get it is because we always ave a dozen arguments left whes you npid men are "all run out.--Ladies' Home Journal. we hha, 5 . ae S The Difference. | 'A fool is unable to see his own faults, | 'A wise man, seemg his own faults, ts 'able to keep other people from noticing | the | 3904, and is now a permanency. | four | United States cabled its hem.--Chice.«a Record Herate.) 'was two days after the dan, in the Franco-German war, the capture of MacMahon's army and- Napoleon III. The campaign entered upon so confidently by that potentate thus collapsed and he was a prisoner in the hands of the Germans. On the : : ; : | whole erpire to-day, in short, is a evening of the 4th the government of national defence was established, with Gen. Trochu at the head. While this was being dene the Empress Eugenie, disguised, fled secretly from Paris and entered Belgium, on-her way to England, where she has resided ever since. poe o The governmental scheme which was created on September 4 has last- ed 40 yeats and is stronger to-day than it ever was in the past. In duration it has outlived any other! system which Franze has had since: the overthrow of Louis XVI. and the' Bourbons in 1792. The first republic, which began in 1792, lasted, in its various shapes, until 1804, when it gave way to the first empire, under Bonaparte, and that was subverted in 1814, in the war waged against Bonaparte by combined Europe. It was succeeded by the restored Bour-' bon monarchy under Louis XVIII. in 1814, which went down in the revolu-' tion of July, in 1830, Charles X, then' being at its head. The Orleanist monarchy of the Citizen King Louis Philippe, which was created in 1830, was submerged in the storm of 1848, and the second republic was started, which gave place to the second em- pire in 1852, under Napoleon III., and this collapsed at Sedan, when the present regime came into being. Thus the third republic has had a longer career than that of any two of its predecessors since 1792. For several years it was conceded to be only an experiment, which endured because a majority of the French people could not unite upon any other form of government. Along until the end of the Presidency in 1879 of Napoleon III.'s old warrior, MacMahon, there was doubt as to whether it would: weather the storms which seemed to be gathering around it. Even as recently as 1889, in the Boulanger scé the advent of the Man on Horseback was often very confidently predicted. through the tentative death of President stage before Carnot in Just days after Gambetta proclaimed the establishment of the republic the { the new regime and welcomed it council board of the nations. by the great powers of Europe. Its alliance with England and and its ententes with other countries gives France a larger influence in the affairs of the world than it exerted previously since the days of Bona- parte's power in the first republic a century ago. The Careful Sentry. The young private had been posted | as sentry on C squadron stables. But, | lo, when the sergeant of the guard came round onhis visit he was no- where to be seen. The sergeant was about to depart to make inquiries when there came 4 rustling noise from a heap of straw and the sentry stood before him minus his boots and look- ing very sleepy. "Hello!" cried the sergeant. "Hera you are, eh? Where were you when I came round just now?" "Marchin' round,' was the sentry's reply, given in tones of conscious virtue. "Marchin' round, were you? you've got your boots off!" ' "Yes, sergeant; I took 'em off so's I shouldn't wake the 'osses!"--Lon+ don Tit-Bits. The Thieving Arabs. "Their whole lives are given up to the breeding of their flocks and herds and to systematic robbery," ites Douglas Caruthers of his experiences in nortliwestern Arabia. "dhe Bed- | uoin lives in his tent for a week at a time or until the fit comes over him, and he calls his companions, and of they go on a foray to steal camels in 4 | order to increase their own herds. { The Arab's great idea is to possess 4% rifle, for that means power. In order to do this he must steal camels. So, having stolen camels, he purchases a rifle. Then come more raids to take more camels, this time in order to buy a wife. Camels are their sole means of exchange." A Fair Proposition. A popular comedian and playwright was praising the humorous value of surgestions. '"'It is funnier to sug- gest a thing,"' he said, "than to say, eut. Playwrights should remember i Juggestion--pregnant tion--is what makes really funny the little boy's remark to his father. "Pa; if you help jne with my arithmetic jesson to-night I'll tell you where ma hid your trousers.' " sugges- Altogether Wrong "Pa." said the blooming daughter of the household. "L wish you would- n't call young Mr. Softieigh a popin- jay." : "And why not?" "Because he isn't a jay, and there doesn't seery to be any hope of his poppin'."" Bucharest. The population of Bucharest is abeut 500,000. The houses are mostly of one or two stories in"the residential sec- tion and built separately with a great deal of open space. The city is very widespread and covers an area of about twenty-five square miles. A Famous Palace. The palace in the Rue de Lille once owned by Empress Josephine's son, ugene de Beauharnois, Viceroy of Italy, ever since the battle of Water loo has been the home of the Prus- sian representative on the banks of the Seine, A Tragedy. "Deceiver!" she, hissed. you!" "Hate me!" gasped her affianced. '"Why, it was only yesterday you said you loved every hair om my head." "Yes, but not every hair on your shoulder!' she retorted as she held up a bit of golden evidence, "Y hate The Diamond. While the diamond is the hardest substance known, it is also brittle and may be fractured by a blow. But if it is placed between two hard steel faces in a hydraulic press and a slowly accelerating pressure applied hg hard steo! will become indented, | Chinesa empire in the ten yea! _| Two hundred men are studying it in 4 - | 3ut it passed | recognition | of- va A last sehool establi nga by the Government Lespecially for the purpose. There are many wircless stations at Tibet. And even the small Chinese river gunboats are equipped with wireless. The scene of amazing military and educa- tional activity. Wherever I went on the trains | saw military camps, in which part of the 5,000,000 army which China is mobilizing, is being trained. thousands. There are railroad schools, telegraph schools, postofiice schoo!s, eustom house schools normal schools, laboratories, mus¢ums and libearies. The teachers in these schools are part- ly foreign, but chiefly native. All these schools have recently been estab- lished by the Imperial Government itself to further the national desire admire the English-speaking races, and turn their thumbs up as a sign of gratification whenever they see one: of our fellow-countrymen. In spite of the fact that the Im- perial Government is giving the Chi- nesg every sible concession in the way of education, there is consider? able dissatisfaction at being governed under a regency, China's last three monarchs have been babies when they first camme to the throne. The Chinese feel that they are passing through 4 eritieal period of their history, and that they need especially now a full- grown man to govern them. For this reason, what might be called China's "anti-baby"' feeling is very strong. Making Cigarette Paper. Rice paper, with which 'cigarettes are made, has nothing to do with rice, but is made from the membranes of the breadfruit tree, or, more com/é monly, of fine, new trimmings of flax and hemp. France makes cigar- ette papers for the whole world, the output of Austria and Italy being insignificant. So light is this paper that 500 of the tiny shects goes ao the ounce. They are perfectly combustible, and give off the minimum of smoke. Be- fore being rolled with tobacco they. are analyzed to prove that they are free from deleterious ingredients and that they contain nothing but the purest paper fiber. Only new material--flax and hemp ¢rimmings--is used, and these are thoroughly purified. Chopped _ by. machinery into minute particles, they are well mixed by a revolving fan, | Russia | | stance may be | goes a thorough washing process, the | I,' "? he observed. | Why, | and then reduced almost to dust. and soda. In order that every foreign sub- eliminated it under- water being obtained from artesian wells sunk for the purpose. The pulp is again rolled out into paper. 'This is of grayish tinge and the pure white of the finished leaf is obtained by an electric process, which also cleanses it of all possible impurities. Amended It. When King George was Prince of | Wales one of his body servants was lence trying to explain to Sir Arthur Bigge some incident that had taken place. "Me and the prince'--he began, when Sir Arthur pulled him up. "You should say 'the prince aud The man looked at him fer a moment and then said: "{ beg pardon, sir, but I did not know you were there at all. How- ever, you and me and the prince." / Sir Arthur was compelled to laugh at this and, after another attempt to explain to the man how the story. should be told, was content to let him tell it in his own fashion.--Pearson's Weekly. Naming the Baby. Down in Princeton there is a baby four months old who has not yet-beenu christened. It has worried the friendd of the parents, for they are anxious t¢ know what the child is to be called The other day a friend of the fathez stopped him on the street and said: "Named the baby yet?" "No, not yet," was the answer. "Well, why don't you name him?" "What's the use? He's red-headed; isn't he?"' "But . what make?"' "All the difference in the world. Tf wouldn't do us any good to name him, The kids wouldn't call him by it any: how."" A MAN AGAINST A NATION. The Most Curious European War That Was Ever Waged. The most curious European war ever waved Was that which in the sixteenth eentury, the period of the reformation and the renaissance, was carried on single handed for between five and six 's between a bankrupt grocer of Serlin and the elector of Saxony, who was the post powerful German prince of the period. The grocer's hame was Hans Woblhase, and the immediate cause of the quarrel was the arresting vf two of his horses in the elector's territory, he being a subject of the elector of Brandenburg. Failing to get redress, he adopted what was then a perfectly legal expedient and de- clared forimal war on the realm of Sasony, The declaration was accepted in due form, and the war began. The extraordinary part of the story is that the grocer kept the war up for eneurly six years practically single difference does tha handed and even went to the extrein- | ity of declaring war on his own sover- eign in the meantime before he was cnught. He burned farins and even villages, employed mercenaries after the fashion of the times and made himself the terror of the district. He was finally influenced to stop hostili, ties by Luther, and after he had taken the sacrament from his hands he was betrayed into a further act of hostility, by treachery and, being captured, suf- fered death on the wheel after refus- Ing an act of grace which granted him the painless and honorable death of the sword. The story is perhaps the strangest of all the romances of that romantic age.-- Westminster Gazette, 1 , ne geen Te ' An Example. aa "The evil than men do &res after them." Even when the amateur cor- net piayes dies he leaves the fatal in- | steument bebind.--London 'Tit-Biw en years | suits of men. "many cabwomen and in some of our Sohools are being opened literally by | for being up to date. The Chinese | to original conditions. ps we are swerving, pre- 'paring to turn. Hackscss = ~ Women are breaking into the pure tn Paris there are cities in the west policewomen. There are women lawyers, women barbers. bartenders, farmers, physicians and journalists. Women are smoking cigarettes, and the men, some of them, are trying to break themselves of the habit. * eee : . On the other hand men are break- ing into the pursuits of women. They are becoming cooks and bottlewash- ers. In London some of the men do the ironing, the washing, the darn- ing, and the cooking. Many men are marrying for money and living idle. lives. Up in the air men are trying to imitate the birds. Down below, in. automobiles, they are trying to imi- tate the wind. One wonders if we are going back 1 From the working women and the idling men of to-day it is but a short jump back- ward to the Indians who loitered in the woods while the squaws did all the work. From the women who smoke cigarettes to-day it is but a short step backward to the women who used to smoke clay pipes. Per- haps it won't be long before we are again swinging airily among the trees, from limb to limb, knocking down cocoanuts. : #ILL NOT HAVE THEM SPOILED, Queen Mary a Spartan When It Comes to Keeping Children's Tastes Simple. When it comes to imbuing her chil- dren with simple tastes, Queen Mary, ef England, surely has all other royal mothers "stopped." A certain young woman, who is a great favorite with' the royal children, whom she knows through their French governess, re- ceived an evidence of the length to which the Queen goes in this respect. The young woman in questi¢n, when the little Prince John, a special pet oi hers, was ill short time ago, begged to be allowed to send him a Teddy bear, to replace a worn-out one he had been in the habit of taking to bed with him, after the fashion oi many children, royal and otherwise. The Queen consented that the prince a a | It Slowly but Sure "who have should aceept the gift and the friend | straightway purchased tne largest, fut- | bear | possible, which she despatched to the | test and mest elaborate Teddy palace. Her surprise was great when a lit®e note from the Queen saying that she always liked the chiidren to | : * | aroused him to activity and he became ; a scholar, philosopher, poet, wit, states- have only the most unpretentious toys, and that as Prince John's last Teddy bear was but a quarter of the | size of the present one she considered 'it would be better to have the same | | kind. crushed and | hurriedly * | est specimen of the breed. The astonished young woman exchanged the large, ro bust and costly Teddy for a most mod- The same treatment is been of a simple kind, and she is re- quired to make their clothes herself, in the intervals ef stitching flannel petticoats for the poor, with which task she oceunjes much of her time. The Birth of Reform Schools. The first reform school for juvenile delinquents was probable the one or- ganized at Metray, near Louvre, France, about the year 1859 by M. de fetz, a noted councillor of Paris. M. de Tetz found in some wealthy neblemen the financial assistance he needed to materialize his idea, andl the school was started with the most beneficent results. The idea was taken hold of in other quarters wot only of France, but of other continental coun- tries and the enthusiasm created by the work resulted in the grand "'con- ference of the reformatory union," the real beginning of our present day work in behalf of juvenile delinquents. The Hours of the Day. The ancient Egyptians divided the day and night inte twelve hours each, a custom adopted by the Jews and Greeks probably from the Babylon- ians. The day was first divided into hours in Rome by L. Papirius Cursor, who about B.C. 293 erected a sun dial in the temple of Quirinus. Prior to the invention of water clocks (158 B.C.) the time was called at Rome by p ie criers. In England in early times the measvrement of time was uncertain. One expedient was by wax candles, three inches burning an hour andisix wax candles burning twenty- four hours, or a day. His Last Breath. reflections upon the value of breath, writes a correspondent, recall an old riddle which asked what it was that no man wished to take and no man wished to give up. The answer Fiis last breath. Charles Lamb had an epicurean desire concerning his own Jast breath, half of whicb at any rate comes home to many of us. Macready heard him express the hopa that he might draw it in throagh a pipe and exhale it in a pun. Certain- ly that would be the most precious breath on record.--Londop Chronicle fhe was, A Rain Trap. In a time of distressing drought says a writer in The Yorkshire Post, a hurassed amateur agriculturist step- ped into a shop to buy a barometer. The shopman was giving a féw stereo- typed instructions about indications and pressures when the purchaser impatiently interrupted him. "Yes, yes,'> said he, '"'that's ail right, but what I want to know is how do you set it when yctu want it to rain?" Each In His Own Field. Papa--See that spider, my bey. spinning his web. Is tt not wonderfut? Do you reflect that, try as lie may, ne man could spin that web? Johnny--What of it? See me spia this t6p? Deo you. teflect, try -as-he| may, no spider could spin this top? nn anal For Body and Soul. : Hiere is a curious advertisement, re- pubushed in the Cornhill Magazine from an eighteenth century paper: "wWanted--For a family who hare bad health, a sober, steady person, in the eapacity of a doctor, surgeon and apothecary. He must occasionally a in tl capaci of butler and dress haiy Wad Mae BE walk be iedulced fo bead prayers oceasionaily and to preach a sermon every Sunday. The reason 0 this advertisement is that the family cannot any lounger afford the expense of the physical tribe and wish to be at a certain expense for their bodies and é en | by his mother. the bear came back again to her with | accorded | Princess Mary. Her dolls have always | { of duties, a little better and better-the souls, A good salary, will be glvepe" nog the, Beat "2 Selence bas broaght to 1 curiously "int | martable stil 4 : Stes {1 termi me distrustful of | - line just how worry : is believed by many : - followed carefully the | growth of the scieuce of brain dis- euses that scores of the deaths' set down to their causes are due to worry and that alune. The theory is a sim- ple ous, so simple that any one cana" readily understand tt. wy ; Briefly put, it amounts' to this: Wor- ry injures beyoud repair certain cells of the brain, and, the brain being the nutritive center of the bedy, the other organs become gradually injured, and when some diséases of these organs or 9 combination of them arises death finally ensues. Ses Thus worry kills, Insidlously, like many other diseases, it creeps upon the brain in the form of a single, con- stant, never lost idea, and as a drop- ping of water over a period of years will wear a groove in the stone, so does worry gradually, imperceptibly and no less surely destroy the brain celis that lead all the rest, which are, so to speak, the commanding officers of mental power, health and motion. Worry, to make the theory still stronger, is an irritant at certain points, which produces little harm if it comes at intervals or irregularly. QOceasional worriment the brain can cope with, but the iteration and the reiteration of one idea of a disquiet- -{ng sort the cells of the brain are not proof against. It is as if the skull were laid bare and the surface of the brain struck lightly with a hammer every few sec- onds with mechanical precision, with never a sign of a stop or the failure of a stroke. Just in this way does the annoying idea, the maddening thought that will not be done away with, strike or fall upon certain nerve cells, never ceasing, diminishing the vitality of the delicate organisms that are so minute that they can be seen only under_the microscope.--Journal of Physiological Therapeutics. JUVENILE BLOCKHEADS. | Stupid Boys Who Developed Into Werld Famous Men. There is quite a long record of fa- mous men who in their boyhood. were regarded as fools and dullards. Sir Walter Scott was called a "blockhead"™ The mother of Brins- ley Sheridan despaired of teaching him the simplest elements. Her death man and orator, Dean Swift, the keen- est wit of his age, was "plucked" at Dublin university. Newton, Shake speare, Michelangelo and Oliver Gold- smith all come in the category. One day a slatternly woman rushed out of a little grocer's shop gripping an unkempt boy by the ear, and as she pulled him along she shouted to her neighbor: "My heart is fairly broke with that brat, Tammy, and he is so stupid he ean learn nothin'!" That stupid brat Tammy became the poet Tom Moora In a country schoolhouse in Queen's county, Ireland, a boy with a blunt knife cut in the desk "A. W.," the in- {tials of his name. The teacher, who caught him in the act, cried out: "Stupid, you are better at cutting let- ters and destroying Uesks than you are at learning your lessons!' That boy was Arthur Wellesley, known to fame as the Duke of Wel- lington, hero of Waterloo, In the middle years of the last cen- tury, in St. Malachy's college, Belfast, a boy carved the letters "C. R." in the wood. The French professor reported him and declared that he 'was besides a worthless boy, who would never amount to anything." "} will amount to more than you!" returned the youth. He did, for he became lord chancel- lor of Englaund--Lord Russell of HKil- lowen.--Londou Graphic. ' Some Famous Echoes. There is a famous echo on the Rhine between Coblentz and Bingen which repeats a word seventeen times, while in the sepuleher of Metella, the wife Sulla, in the Roman Campagna, there is an echo which repeats ye times in different keys and will alse give back with distinctness a heraii- eter line which requires two aud & half seconds to utter. Brewster men- tions an echo on the north side of Shipley cbureh, in Sussex, England, which repeats twenty-one syllables. Not Ladylike. "What do you think T ought to say to you for coming home so late--and in such a condition?' demands the lady of the house. "Perish zhe shought!" gracefully re- plies the courteous lLusband. "Perish zhe shought! M' dear, surely you would not sh'pose I would ever shink you ought to shay zhe shings I shink you ought to shay!'--Judge. : Curved Bridges of Japan. The curved bridges of Japan are 0} three kinds--first, those known ag spectacle bridges, with an arch in the centre suggesting a pait of spectacles, second, the camel back bridges, which go up very high indeed; third, the or, dinary one arch, semicircular bridges The reason the Japanese so often have ; eurved bridged is because until mod, ern times they could not build them flat, and even to-day there is no key stone to the Japanese arches. They are not generally familiar with the keystone, A great many of two classe¢ of bridges---the camel baek and thd high curved bridges--are found in the paiace grounds at Pekin, in China. ra ee Gam nn ee t Fase ytmeg ees: pate? A Good Actor. "J gee you have an actor employed: on the farm." ee ee re "Yes, I put him on. He's a darn good; actor too. I thought he was working, he first week he was here,"--Kansas ty Times. ee ee ee aN See pag "AT The Little Things. ky Tt is not the straining for great things that Is most effective; it fs the doing the little things, the common t t tells, Destroys the Calla S gives pat a friend's house be was struck by : | [ than all xex@monies Talmud, ng : the appearance of a servant girl who waited upon the table and perguaded . 'iis bost to allow ber to enter bis em- ploy. This she did and for a short time heid the 'position of cook in Sir ticury's household. 'Then he made ber Lady Parkes. : : Sy NS Hut more illustrious than this Js the case of Peter the Great. One day he was dining at the house of Prince Men-_ shikoff. He noticed one of the servant }maids particularly, and, though she was not handsome, she caught his fan- cy. Her name, the prince told the-- ezar, was Martha. She had been a servant in the house of a~ Lutheran 'minister of Marienburg, and when that city was captured by the. troops of Russia she had been taken prisoner by General Bauer, who had passed her over to the prince, whose servant she was. The count politely made a present of her to the czar, who even- tually married her. | = : William Cobbett, the great writer, when he was only twenty-one years of. age, one morning chanced to see a bux- om servant girl busily engaged in wasbing the family linen. The girl was pretty, so Cobbett spoke to her, learned her name and the same even-. ing called upon her parents and said he would like to marry, their daughter. The parents of the girl informed the young man that they had no objec- tions to him as their son-in-law, but that he would have to wait until their daughter was of a marriageable age. Five years later Cobbett, true to his early love, married her. A WEIRD INCIDENT. Chopin's Funeral March Was Inspired by a Skeleton. -- : Late one summer's afternoon, said: Ziem, Chopin and I sat talking in my studio. In one corner of the room steod a.piano and in another the com- plete skeleton of a man with a large white cloth thrown, ghostlike, about it. I noticed that now and again Chopin's for a ho! al ran him far beyond his mark; consequent-, ly he fell some ten feet on the other, side. caiiy TERA SAS Now, it happened that s hungry croc= odile was at the same time drawing a bee line under water toward the itive. When the crocodile had almost | come upon his prey he beard a splash | just in front and made a dash, bring- ing his enormous jaws down on 'the tiger's paw. a The bather nearly fainted with -- fright when he saw the tiger fall into -- the water, and for a few moments he could not understand why the crea ture did not devour him. Why did he ~ persist in keeping one of Kis paws un- -- der water, beating savagely with the other? And the water turned red! Then all at once the assaults of the tiger became more furious, and his growls developed into roars, The huge tall of a crocodile reared up out of the water. The obvious intention was: to pull the tiger under water and! drown him, and the tiger, understand-. ing tbis purpose, tried to frustrate It, by beating the snout of the crocodile; with his other paw. was too far down, and he left much of his force on the surface of the wa- ter. His struggles became more and more feeble, and at length he disap- peared altogether, only a cluster of bubbles remaining to show where he, had been. His fight, however, had been a game one, not entirely in vain, for when the bodies of the two beasts finally , came to the surface it was seen that) the tiger bad literally torn away the. whole front of the crocodile's face and bad blinded it so that its victory was, a useless one.--Chicago Record-Herald. cel FALLING BODIES. ee * Their Velocity Varies According to the Force of Gravity. i A man falling from a three story gaze would wander; and from my knowledge of the man I knew that his Shoughts were far away from me and iis surroundings. More than that, I xnew that he was composing. Presently he rose from his seat with- out a word, walked over to the skele- | ton and removed the cloth. He then | carried it to the piano and, seating | himself, took the hideous object upon death, Then, drawing the white cloth round himself and the skeleton, he laid the latter's fingers over his own and began | to play. There was no hesitation in | the slow, measured flow of sound | which he and the skeleton conjured up. As the music swelled in a louder strain I closed my eyes, for there was something weird in that picture' of man and skeleton seated at the pfano, with the shadows of evening deepen- ing around them and the ever swelling and ever softening music filling the air with mystery. And 1 knew I was lis- tening to a composition which would live forever. The music ceased, and when I lobked up the piano chair was empty, and on the floor lay Chopin's unconscious form, and beside him, smashed all to pieces, was the skeleton I prized so much. The great composer had swoon- ed, but his march was found. An Empire Sold at Auction. The Roman empire was once sold to the highest bidder. On the death of Pertinax in 198 the Praetorian guards put up the empire for sale by auction, and after an animated competition be- tween Sulpician and Julian it was knocked down to the latter for 6,250 drachmas. The Remans held auctions of various kinds, the proceedings be- ing much the same in all cases. The | auctio sub hasta, which was a sale of | plunder, was held under a spear stuek in the ground, The magister auctionis, or auctioneer, was chosen from among the argentarli, or money changers, and his assistants were the cashiers. Those Little Dishes. Tommy ate his first meal at a coun- his Knees--a strange picture of life and | | Yueatan, | puilding in New Orleans will not fall ' as fast as he would if be were in New | York city, In fact, in hardly any two | places will. he fall with the same speed. This is because as we go to- ward the equator the force of gravity | gets less and less, and consequently ' the acceleration of a falling body be- | comes less, and the force of impact is | therefore less. While it does not make very much difference in the injury to a person falling from a height, it does make a | and fire it exactly horizontally, and if | the gun is sixteen feet above the ground, say, at New York the bullet fired from such a rifle will strike the ground in exactly one second after It leaves the rifle. If the bullet has a horizontal velocity of 1,000 feet per second it will strike the earth exactly: 1,000 feet away. Let us take the same rifle to a place where the force of gravity is not the same as at New York, but a good deal smaller, say two-thirds smaller. We find that if the gun is placed sixteen feet above the ground, as before, and absolutely horizontal the bullet will not fall the sixteen feet in one second, but will take over one and a half seconds to fall, thus enabling the bullet to be in the air during that length of time. Therefore it will strike the ground about 1,600 feet away. Thus it is seen that the range of a rifle is increased, as it is taken toward the equator, Of course there is no place on the earth where the force of gravity ts two-thirds smaller than at New York,, but there are many places where tha difference {ts considerable enough té affect slightly the range of rifles.--Hat per's Weekly. ba The Chicle Tree. Chewing gum is nothing but chicl¢ mixed with sugar and flavoring, and chicle is the gum of a tree that grows, plentifully in Mexico and Central America and that of recent years has been cultivated on a large sealé in The chicle tree is not unlike the india rubber tree, and the gum try hotel when he was nine years old, | and the experience was an event. He was especially interested in the cal- lection of small, thick dishes contain- ing side orders scattered about his place. When he went home he gave a graphic description of the meal. "And what do you think, mamma," he concluded, "we ate most of the things out of birds' bathtubs.'--Wo- man's Home Conipunion, Tingling Ears. If your cars burn, people say, some one is talking about you, 'his is very old, for Pliny says, "When our ears do glow and tingle some do talk of us in our absence." Shakespeare in "Much Ado About Nothing" makes Beatrice say to Ur- sula and Hero, who had been talking of her, "What fire is in mine ears!" Sir Thomas Browne ascribes this angels, who touch the right ear if the talk is favorable and. the left if other wise. his is done toa cheer or wary. One ear tingles, some there be That are snarting now at mel omnenanE 8 The Advice Seeker. conceit to the superstition of guardian |- was first shipped to America by men who believed that in it they had a per- fect substitute for rubber. In this, - | bewever, they were mistaken, as it was | found that the chicle gum was insolu- dle, Not to this day has any medium acid or alkali, spirit or ether been found tbat will dissolve {t.--Argonaut. eontarniteemensnenct Reneccninianassrattiem, = Folerance. ca Jane--I've something on me mind, *Arry, that I hardly knows how to tet yer. Arry--Abt wiv it. : Jaue--I'w afraid yer won't marry me if 1 tells yer, y "Arry--Alit wiv it. Jane--I'm a somnambulist, 'Arry, *Arry (after prolonged pause)--Nevet mind, Jane, it'll be all right. If there ain't no chapel for It we'll be macried ata registry.--London Punch. Just the Other Way. Rudyard Kipling was once visiting. ata country house at which Miss Dor-| othy Drew, the famons granddaughter of Mr. Gladstone, then a little girl, was also staying, She was sent out into the "When a man asks me for adyice," | said the good natured person, "T al ways find myself getting into'a dis- eussion." | "Well," replied Mr, Sirius Barker, | "most of us ask for advice because we would rather argue than work," Washington Star. I , Unpeeled. 1 2d - Mr, Tecentmarrie (who has plunged a spoon intd dish preparatory to help- ing to the pudding)--Why, Mary, I feel some hard, smooth, round things in the dish. I wonder what they can be. Mrs. Recentmarrie--Wby, they're eggs, John; there are six, just as the tecipe says.--Chicago News. | , x sceneries Nt Teving kindness is greater 'than laws, and the charities of life are more ok FR ae ma as hae garden with the distinguished author. Tater on, when the other grownups joined them, lite Miss Dorothy was asked, "I hope you didn't bore Mr, Kipling!" . "No, but he bored me frightfully,"| was the unexpected and resigned ce ply. et : eae . a tks ! i ns Wait a Bit. ' Guest--Look here. How long am f going to have to wait for that balf por- tion of duck I ordered? Walter--THL -- somebody orders the other balf. We can't go out and kill half a duck.--To- , ledo Blade. eg ee = fa ety bok ae ee Flirtation, yikes "What really constitutes filrtation?" asked the young man of the woman of . the world. ae | "Attention witireut intentio plied the experienced oar-- aa ow cote) SM | peace Re Put the snout! ~