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Sentinel- Jo urnai. Published Weekly. pCKENS, SOUTH CAROLINA. When doctors graft it is folly to be sick. Another thing that will make Mil waukee famous is a "woman police man. Why worry over good roads when we are all -on the verge of taking to -Wings? If war scares keep on accumulating they may be offered by the dozen at reduced rates. When women are required to sit on juries they should be permitted to bring-their knitting. Western farmers are returning to Ahe effete east to buy up the leserted farms of that section. Fir lumber has gone gone up one dollar on the thousand. Now, all to gether: This is going too- fir! Goose-bone prophets are of the opinion that this winter will stretch out as long as a British election. Alfalfa in various forms is to be served at a' banquet in Colorado. 'Now who is "brother to the ox?" Alexander wept because he had no more worlds to conquer when he should have hustled around. and found a few. Pittsburg ants to annex about a dozen suburbs. This is likely to start a new annexation movement in Cleveland. The unarmored cruiser Detroit. which cost $.,233,000, has just been sold for $20,000. So run the fighting ships away. New York's largest hotel is to cost $17,000,000. Ir is to be built on Her ald square a't Twenty-fourth street and Broadway. School -teachers think they are en titled to pensions, but can teaching be called Wai since corporal punish ment has been abolished! A Boston man declares that he can prove that there are nine hells, and we presume that discovering that the furnace fire is out is one of them. That New York man who started to shoot himself, but -thrice changed his min(' in time to dodge the bullets may .1-ve. to: congratulate himself on his fickleness. Morocco ai to pay money to Spain for the war which Spain recently fought in Morocco. Such is the em barr~ssing consequence of coming out only second best. Maybe some time they will invent a padded . aeroplane which will not rise more than ten feet from the ground. Then the careful man- will become interested. He has football in tae fall and track athletics and baseball in the Sspring.-and n'ow the college student has ice hockey all winter. And yet ~he is said to play too little. Iiithe y.ear'1910 the American hen laid 1'7~dozen eggs for every man. woman and child in the country. We -have reason for believing. howeyer, that at least several dozen of those eggs are still in cold storage. A report from Berlin has It that Emperor William has become inter ested In boxing. It is -~ot likely, how ever, that he will at his time cf life *try for the middle-weight champion ship of Germany. Men who began' life as waiters now ~own one of Chicago's biggest hotels. But, of course, they were good waiters and never spilled soup down any -body's back nor forgot to renew the contents of the finger bowls. The Episcopal bishop of Michigan says that bridge whist players are just as much gamblers as Wall street plungers or ' Monte Carlo, patrons. They must play for more than a quar -ter of a cent a point out that way. By, drinking 20 bottles of beer a day f or 3'0 days a St. Louis man won a suit of tailor-made clothes and $250 in money, but the chances are that a man with a thirst like that will pawn the clothes, and he certainly won't have the money long. If that ship that got into New York the other day with a load of ele phants and'pythons and other crea tures could have been stuffed into the stockings of several million children it would probably have settled for all time their demand for Noah's ark-s. When rat - carry plague and cats and dogs tl'at kill or drive them away carry diphtheria and tuberculosis. both of which are affirmed by the ex perts, it seems there is nothing left for threatened humanity but to get off the earth. That technical secret attack upon the Atlantic coast by our returning battleship fleet will be valueless un less the Mqle St. Nicholas liar and the New England fake'r who heard se much cannotading at sea in 1898 are ullowed to cge+ into the game. ini Tm AKI ~'iarR~By 8)' AIRJO/?y P2/a Cu 4 MERICANS' have the reputation of be ing quick witted and shrewd. As a matter of fact we are Barnumized bluffers, far more gullible and credu lcus than any class of any nation. Right now, in nearly every moder ate-sized city of the United States we are falling in line and dropping gold into the tills of organized fake auc tion stores and taking in exchange. a misrepresented article. These bogus auction stores are more harmful to us as a nation than all the old time lotteries, policy games, mail-order fakes and circus grafts, including gold bricks and shell games,, combined. They are not honest. They play "heads we win, tails you lose." Uncle Sam doesn't want to bring up his boys in the business; yet he countenances it, and over 530 of his cities Issue licenses regularly to the auctioneers of these fake companies, giving them the privi lege of swindling the public at a nominal fee. Any town with over 10,000 blind, Barnumized Yankees waiting to be buncoed is considered a fertile field. From coast to coast, ThE PROPRIETOR from line to line, we find in nearly every state from one to forty cities upporting temporary aution swindles. Few{ re permanent; It is a ______ ushroom b u s in e s s THE( CA3hIER ** which springs up over ight in a cheap store, leased from month to onth, and stays until trouble occurs or the field is worked dry. New York city alone demands to -be duped y no less than eight practically permanent com anies of this sort, only shifting their positions to reener fields as the crowds change.. There aire three ways to tell a legitimate auc ton. If the place is permanent and advertises ales on certain days, if the goods 'to be sold re catalogued piece for piece, and if there are no utside men hired to control the bidding, then t is certain that the sale is genuine. The fake auction game is played under the seudo patronage of reliability. The auctioneer's Th cense, issued by the city, is hung conspicuously ivy ear the door and the goods are claimed to have ter een consigned from private sources or pawn- syr rokers in nearby cities. It is misrepresentation pe rom the start. As a matter of fact the goods "d ere picked up in job lots from noy-elty houses, p jbbers, Japanese stores and regular auction sup- mar ly firms who handle job lots of trashy stuff tt nd are to be found in all the larger cities. The tur iories they handle are made of cheap clay by wh srewd Japs who have scraped through the shell mi f American bluff and found the flabbiness of thero fesh beneath. These antiques crumble to pieces sw fer six months in a heated apartment. Practi- th< ally all the goods handled in these stores are to ade on. the same principle and bought at from a ne-fifth to one-fiftieth of what they will bring at i There is nothing criminal in selling at an ex- ist rbitant profit if the purchaser gets the square cai eal. But a fake auction company is primarily a in ring of cheats never intentionally giving anyone the square :leal. Ito: The proprietor is the arch rogue. His profit int epends on selling an article at anywhere from ffty to two, three and sometimes five hundred is ollars. The auction does not pay if run for the wa verage buyer; it is merely a trap, a "plant," forsp he cccasional "good thing" who happens in and is cuickly relieved of a large amount of money a brough an elaborate system he never suspects. 'a It Is a joyless game, played on cut-and-dried ter rules which admit of no freshness or originality. he average cast-for they are all actors and Do play the same cheap show every day-is made up abt f one backer, or proprietor, two auctioneers, one thE pretty girl cashier, and from two to ten "shills" aut (the pale-faced people with mushy morals), their thE umber depending on the size and situation of te store. The backer usually !s a shrewd and unscrupti ms man who rents a vacant store, fills it with a ne scattering of cheap, showy articles to attract at tention and a number of large so-called "works f art;" and "antiques" which, on inspection, w prove to be minors. The range runs from foun- o am pens at ten cents to deceptive "ivories, ed "bronzes" and -'paintings by the old masters" thatst bring from fifty to two hundred and fifty dollars,to and sometimes more, from the uninitiated. . The proprietor hires a pretty girl cashier and sti -ounts her as an additional attraction. He gets one or two auctioneers-they usually travel in rie pais, to relieve one another and the public-and pe uarantees them ten per cent. of the sales; which p omission runs from forty to two hundred dollars week.- ye: Then the dealer incorporates the backbone of the e whol crooke bsness-the body of "shills." Th tht hewhl th[utineI thsfctt4h ally inhs pe hedd':slc SoI a word "shill,"torn"shil r" in fullins ofsinde-c minate ordgin.sItecs ," "boosspec"e"rnoger, eon" nel "uAsid es forthe sabbysrea endling ilame:orn"shis- Iae okn mn sae orstopin at ihsuto ndpeedn haveyno wineto "ca thmae.btryn boreospeople aringer gaaighisl nhe" good tecrnaeslthrogh cunn ndcat Witout thes shby cream- utoncn x ef core uin buzardwsol too he by rsalstyansaemrdesl oie suh plaes workin retwe the public ond whom propietorameelis thi pcase outunuseing among -sned whbyp the acionur and prceyten Thae shol cocix with the a.eH, betraings or of justple an danaterse buerattn himelfn their good fgfrhc thg cunnborandwe craft Ofhusinuallr wsonlythe ocnrs thee i the usedrs sraersds caled mor techil snoce uchple." They threecrooks men whoms prorieto rsceistr pc.u"ussetigv Pitrs saroom by theetrgi lure and joceytwiem Thle shill mioe th ealroare isn busiess vetoe lookgsk an intrest ed erand ierin itfomte ofyf whichupot te elboe ebitae thin firm;ibenalfo hothlre sceters are rum'.AT E odTeODY. e e crs Pictu anyom4 feeaitc ho ande 20 fee wide. unedors tohe deprcak areentinl fophis e ndhsme hangslementicingred fag. in ne as hanth prprs tond malgaities c n ofrm benarth at intlargeaucttrs androt Pick utghn arcsbruaintc who aives in heal mbleis farl rosherousrand as ofe toakec rb house oand0 ona 30,00 pouino looke h fo thselay, purcasqes, presn suddenly read som thatpeentsllog for fargin He ghans reag the aer andr maais ac >pne. of book tind fantiquautos an naro the hghlasses bogtb aiis hnh "Genne her flgrntfln cofcae fake c : hose and look in t hev window, heape,"d auctioneer srgi"ng wit ight bdull-faem. ink of that! Not a tenth of their value. Why, ) 'Il M~I. I don't believe you gentlemen would give $2.50 to see statue of liberty do a Salome dance@ Twc dollars bid, oh, shill! Two dollars!" , Jones, your out-of-town friend, is undebided whether to go in or not; but at that moment a fellow near the door shakes his head to a seem ing stranger beside him and says in a low voice: "It's a shame. Things are going for nothing. Wish I had the price to buy some of that cut glass. It'll sell for a song." Jones overhears and is interested. He thinks the mind of everybody in that store is centered on the opera glasses, going so cheap. He smiles at their rapt attention and the auctioneer's hard luck complaints. The smile would disappear in stantly if he knew that he .himself was the sole concern of the eight minds in that audience, and the auctioneer. He would be furious if he knew ale of the opera glasses was a sham; that when w Jonesey looking in he immediately transmitted hill nearest the door by saying, "Oh, shill," casu h. Jones had never heard the word, so naturally t with suspicion from the auctioneer's jargon, and when the man near the door remarked about cut gains. matter of fact Jones was interested in cut glass. e liked it and occasionally he invested in some, it e nearest he could get to diamonds. te saunterdd in casually and watched with an smile the frantic auctioneer trying to sell a watch. Jones wasn't interested in watches. He had one in his pccket; so his eyes continually roved toward the cut glass in a little Japanese cabinst. He' didn't know it, but beiore h n place two minutes, while the auctioneer was trying to "feel him out" with the watch, one of the shills had noticed Jones's interest in cut glass, and had called the auctioneer's attention to the fact by touching the cabinet signifi cantly. 1The auctioneer, on his perch above them all, had control of the situation. He noted the signal from the shill, jotted down mentally that Jones wanted cut glass, and knocked down the watch he had been experimenting with to one of the shills for a ruinous price, which was all' helpful in showing Jones that a shrewd man could pick up a bargain if he laid low, attracted no attention and bided his time. "Sold for six ninety. Put it with the other goods for Mr. A. Deposit suffcient," the auc tioneer cried to the pretty cashier. Jones did not bid on the first piece of cut glass. The auctioneer did not look toward him once to give him a chance. The piece was knocked down for $3.80. It was a frightful bar gain. Jones would have given $5 for it him self. But the auctioneer passed abruptly to the next article. Jones pressed forward this time as a gor Sgeous punch bowl was put up. He heard varn ous exclamations around him, all tending to give him confidence in the fact that things rere going'dirt cheap. Two ladies beside him com niserated ~because they wouldn't have enough "Gentlemen and ladies," the auctioneer went on olemnly, "if I had this article in Chicago or New ork it would bring one hundred dollars, one hun Ired dollars. You couldn't duplicate it at retail or less than two hundred.' It is the finest piece of rt glass ever shown in your City." "Can I get one hundred dollars? Ninety? Eighty? seventy-five dollars? Can I get sixty? Fifty? Give ne forty; thirty-line; thirty!" "Fifteen dollars!" came a halting voice from beside Jones. Jones was interested. He sensed a bargain. lad he known that when the auctioneer said 'thirty-line" it was a signal to the shill beside Jones to bid $30 with a line through it, or fifteen ctual dollars. he would not have been so enthu iastic.. "Sixteen!" "Seventeen!" "Half!" "Eighteen!" ;taccato offers punctuated the atmosphere after the Luctioneer's encouragement. The little man beside Jones shook his head "Gee, it's gone beyond me," he sighed, turning o Jones; it'll go dirt cheap, too. If you could buy hat for $50 it'd be a bargain, sure enough." Twenty-eight is the last bid," wailed the auc ;oneer. "Why, you could take it out and pawn tfor more than that." Jones thrilled as the auctioneer turned to look Quarely at him. "You'd give thirty, wouldn't you?" he criedi Jones gulped and nodded. The auctioneer skilfully led up to the grand Lading by taking offers of "thirty-six" and "thirty seven" from members of his troupe. He bad felt ut his man carefully and knew that $40 wdfuld be Jones's limit. "Will you give me forty?" he said simply, in a Level tone, leaning far over the showcase. Jones hesitated, gulped, and then nodded bin ead abruptly. Jones was pleased with his bargains -until he got home and his wife told him he could get th'e same punch bowl for $10 anywhere and that the ethmerstf was worthless. THE POTASH CONTROVERSY German Claims Presented at Wash ington Are Contradicted by American Interests. Washington, D. C., Jan.-The offton growing states are particularly inter ested in the potash controversy be tween the State Department and- Ber lin, since the future price of fertilizer is directly affected by the outcome. German interests have just made rep resentation to Secretary Knox similar in effect to those assertions made by circular letter to the miners through out the South claiming that the Ger man potash law, which places. a pen alty on mines selling heavily to Amer icans at a lower price than has merly ruled, is merel a part of general conservation policy of many. According to Ochsimus, a lea'.7 German geologist, there are ab 39,000 square miles of potash In, section of Germany, each of t containing some 50,000,000 tons c' pure potash. This same authory states that the annual output from these mines is about 600,000 tons eaca. and -he figures that If the annual out put should jump to 5,000,000 tons an nually, it would still require 621,6004 years to exhaust the supply. Another of Germany's assertions is that the law does not discri2inate against Ameridans. The brief of the American potash buyers committee submitted to congress points out that, under the law as recently passed by Germany, the mines of the potash trust in that country were allowed a proportion of output sufficient to sup ply the world, while the independent mines that had made contracts to sup ply the United States at a reduced price were limited to one-fourth of their actual sales already made to us. In addition a penalty of $22 per ton was imposed for overproduction. Thus the penalty falls exclusively upon shipments to this country and indi rectly upon the consumer. An effort is apparently being made to create the impression that this con troversy is really a contest between the policy of the German government and an American trust. The fact is that there is no such complete and powerful trust in the United States as this German potash syndicate. This syndicate actually monopolizes the entire potash supply of the world, save for the two mifies that broke away from the trust and sold to Amer ican buyers. In this country there + are about 70 different fertilizer manu facturers using potash, and of these about 75 per cent are Independent of any trust afiliation. Another claim made by the German committee at the White, House was to the effect that the American buyers knew that a law would be passed pro alties to be asesd and that te ' made these contracts with this knowl edge in mind. The American commit tee states positively that this Informa tion was brought to them after the contracts were made, and used as a club in an attempt to force them to give up the contracts already entered into, which would have .reduced. the, price of fertilizer materially in this country.. An official high In the government here is authority for the statement that the cost of this controversy must necessarily fall upon the consumer, and that it should, therefore, be set tIed quickly. While the American companies paying a penalty have met the prices made by the German trust that pays no penalty, this has been done at a loss, and should thiey with draw from the field because of this, the price of fertilizer in this country would be dictated the German monopoly untrammelled in Berlin. The Walkers. James M. Beck, the famous corpora tion lawyer of New York, is a native of Philadelphia, and to Philadelphia he often. returns to see his old friends. Mr. Beck, at a recent banquet in Philadelphia, defended corporations with an epigram. "The trust buster and the Socialist may do what they please," he said, "but mankind will still be divided into two great classes-those who walk to get an appetite for their dinner, and those who walk to get a dinner for. their appetite." DISTEMPER In all its forms among all ages oi hiorses,. as well as dogs, cured and others in same stable prevented from hiaving the disease with SPOHN'S D)ISTEMPER CURE. Every bottle guaranteed. Oirer 600.00G bottles sold last year S$.50 and $1.00. Any good druggist, or send to manufacturers. Agents wanted. Spohin Medical Co., Spec. Contagious Diseases, Goshen, Ind. Inherited. Knicker-Jones has as bad memory. Bocker-His mother never knew what were trumps, and. hiis father couldn't remember anything on the witness stand. TO DRIVE OUT XLAIAA^ Take the 01 8 Sanar 305 A~T CLTONIlo Yo uow whas you r akig less form. Ta n aveS on; the mal and thelo b u tesystem. Sold byanl dalesrs for aoyas: et Any New Methfods? "Ain't it strange, th' way Kelly beats his wifey' "I dunnoa How does hedoltt There are many kinds of pleasue, and some of them aren't so pleant. teh Cure4I S3.intates by Weelford.' SanitaryLotin. ever fails. At No noble thins not drea