University of South Carolina Libraries
WEEHiY EDITION. WIXNSBOEO, S. C., WEDK^SDAY, NOVEMBEE 1, 1882. ESTABLISHED IN 1844. The Poet's KItsI. Across my lap the baby lies, The soul-light dawning in his eyes: I, bending, turn aside to look ^ i Adown the pages of my book. "With flash of thought and fair conceit, y/ The fair lines run on rhythmic feet; And sparkling fancies gem the brink Of this clear well from -which I drink. But sudden, all the poet's skill Is dimmed by something sweeter still, And all his dreamings, high and grand, ? Lie hid beneath a baby's hand. jh I stoop to kiss its dimpled grace, j. torn 10 reaa my aarnng's race, "While falls unheeded to the floor The broken spell which binds no more. O glow of wit! 0 prayer of saint! O brightest picture pen can paint! 0 golden rhythmic rise and fall! My little love is worth you all. For soaring thought and winged word, That pierce the sky like flight of bird, May bring the joys of Heaven more near, But Heaven itself is with me here! ?Mrs. il. E. Blake. TOM GALWAY. As a-general thing we believe that: there are few truly sublime natures, and that this is true is due to the fact that so few cases of true sublimity are surrounded by circumstances calculated to bring them into the general notice of ; the world. There are widely different ideas, too, as to what constitutes a truly : sublime nature. I happened to be a personal friend of the man of whom I am going to write, and I know that but for my pen he would have lived and died unknown outside of the small circle in which he moved. He was an artist by nature frnm fnrr>p nf r?irr>nm stances?lack of confidence in liimself I in the first place?and failure by no j fault of his own, when the opportu-I nity came that would have placed him i where he presumably belonged- At the time when young Galway and I were fast friends and shared the same I rooms, sat at the same table, walked j together, rode together, and in fact j were so inseparable that we came to be i called "the twins," I was struggling | along toward a mediocre fame as a literary man, and Tom was using a paint brush alternately on the neigh-1 boring houses and a large can vas stretched across one of our rooms?the former for bread, the latter for fame. In those days Tom had a widowed mother and young sister to support, and it was hard enough to make both ends meet. Tom's mother and sister occupied the first floor of the dwelling and our rooms were above. j Tom and I had lived together for about: three years, and he had begun three or i four pictures, destined to make him ! famous, as we both though^, and had : given them up and daube$ them all! out again because he hadn'* sufficient | confidence in his talents to believe he I could ever succeed, when I one day be-! *- V<UJUO CHs<?U?UJJ.</dL ?> iUU JLAUg-U. \J ^ mi?y Ckt j young actor of whom I at once became \ an admirer, and forthwith introduced him to Tom. Tom was as bad as I, and ! i- it wasn't long till our new acquaint-; with, us and we M causfe^S^ndl to be demonstrated | Tom and I were both rather sedate i Wj; and grave, while Hugh was as unlike us as it was possible to be almost. Vivacious, w ittv, quick at repartee, he was : a fine type of the whole-souled, gener-' ous Irishman. His ambition towered j nroi- /mrc is a cfjirHv f nll-crrnwn nalr ! towers over the sapling of tender j growth. Booth, McCullough, Irving I were to appear as pygmies beside O'Xeill when he should have attained his full growth in fame. His sanguine temperament acted like ? tonic upon Tom. He seemed to flour- j ? ish and develop under it until it did : I my heart good, and I congratulated I * myself upon having been the means of bringing them together. I have lived to wish that I might have died before I ever saw Hugh O'Xeill, although I Invpd him as loner as T knew him. and love him yet, though our paths have ; diverged and I have not seen him for I7 years. Tom began his grand picture'?the ; grand picture?soon after he cams under Hugh's influence, and I was rejoiced to see how he seemed to feel in-. spiration under Hugh's glowing pictures of what he was capable of j accomplishing if he tried. I have reason to believe, however, that even , Hugh's influence would have failed at j a certain stage of Tom's work .but for j something else that occurred about the j a time the huge canvas began to assume j l some dim outlines of a picture. There! was nothing startling in the last occur-: gjr rence; it was only a new arrival?or I _ rather, three new arrivals in our im- j mediate neighborhood?just across the jr- street, in fact. A middle-aged man of j y rather commanding appearance; a motherly-looking woman, his wife, and a young lady. Tom and I having ffiia orrtrol lofo f\na ovt?n TT iVUVOOV.\.\ VilV auw vuv v > vu iL ing, crossed over and passed the f/k house after dark, and read the- door-plate (which had been nailed on within a hour after the new neighbqg> had taken possession) by the light t ofle street lamp. "VVe made it out to btf horn borough?a rather high-soundk ing name?and discovered the letters : |K M. D. immediately following it, and ; ^ that is how we came first to know that he was a physician. Tom had noticed the young lady jnore particularly than I had, and dis '^ayed an absurd anxiety to see her j ' again. He stood at tl.e window njornfc ings and evenings for a week, and was r\ rewarded by a glimpse of her once or \ twice, and I was really astonished to j ? hear him gush about her appearance, ! # for he had never paid any attention to : the half dozen other girls on the block : fib' ? . I1U dUIiiii C\1 ill 111. JL lW> OC1 t uu~ i JZ concerned myself, for to tell the truth RL I had begun long before to take an interest in Tom's sister, who was just i budding into womanhood. I remon-; strated when Tom got to neglecting JL \ his picture to stand at the window and gaze across the street. "There ar? half a dozen other girls U mjjf on the block, Tom, and, as far as I can B WP judge, much prettier than this one. 1 Besides, she is the daughter of a physician, and I doubt whether she would care tojnake the acquaintance of a S. mere m^hanic." jf I was mistaken in my estimate, how-1 ?,n~ ^ ^ ever, ior ine aocior was irony a $ man of good common sense and a model upon which his family shaped : their ways. Tom embraced the first! opportunity to get acquainted with KS Annie Thornborough, and Hugh and I, j who were usually the leaders, were only tail to Tom's kite in this instance, and trailed along after him and felt a little insignificant when he introduced us two or three days after he had formed acquaintance. There was nothing ; ';rticularly attractive about Miss j orough to me. She had large ! ^^trains't ""?soulful. I remember Tom I ? n.o rofKor ton_ 1 'h an anL* "1<usc muuiui i . .^etnsr I admitted, when k^>ns,; rrl\e idea; brown hair, mk. ,T a golden tint? -o4, mk \ Ml HKSHBL j though there I rebelled and declared j that I thought it decidedly reddish, j much to his disgust?and a form which | I pronounced pretty, without any j prompting from Tom. She was a lady- j like, very pleasant and rather quiet | girl, but I really never thought her j worthy of comparison with little Xel- j i lie Gal way?still I admit a prejudice. I | actually believe Tom hated his trade from the day he became acquainted with Annie, for he had a very exalted j opinion of her, and when he grew: to love her, as he. soon did, j he thought her altogether too! good for a mechanic's wife. You and I can afford to moralize | upon a mechanic's worth, but really I j expect we would have been much like j Tom. It was rather a sudden attach- j ment on his part, but I think he had a j good appreciation of her worth and j admired her character before he loved ! her?which is frequently not the case, j you know. The immediate result of the matter; was that Tom kept us awake nights till 12 o'clock and often later talldng about his future and praising Annie? for we had no secrets from each other then?while a mountain, a river, a bridge, several trees and a number of soldiers gradually put in an appearance on the canvas stretched across ; our largest room, which he called his studio. Tom's ideas were rather grand, ctJUU. X U.U11 0 blliJlll lie cvci nyiacu uii | a canvas less than six by ten, and liis pieces were all historical. The longer he knew Annie Thornborough the more absorbed he became in that picture, and he went less and less frequently across the way, for his visions of the future compared so unfavorably with the actual present that he grew to think that somehow she would be contaminated by association with a plodding workingman, when she was to be the wife of a T Aan'f- f K i n lr ovor .LCll-I.1V/llO <11 UlOW. JL UVU V VMAJUh**. MV V/ V VI. doubted that she would marry him, and I am inclined to think she had given him some encouragement, for I can scarcely conceive such sublime egotism of him as must have been the case otherwise. " It is astonishing to me that I have so long remained a mechanic," he would say, *' when I was all the time possessed of the divine afflatus, but I suppose it required some grand object to develop it." I would have been a little amused at this, but that I saw he was terribly in earnest, and also that the picture was certainly aeveiopmg into sometmng far above anything he had ever attempted before. Hugh O'Neill went away shortly after the beginning of all this, to take lessons under Grierson, and, I am satisfied, looked upon Tom's love affair as a little harmless by-play and expected the picture to go the way all the rest of them had gone. On one of his visits home, when Tom was away decorating the exterior of somebody's walls, I surprised Hugh standing before the picture with a paint brush in his hand. He looked around as I entered, with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. "Whnt- frm it wnnlrl hft t.rt touch that up a little accord- . ing ; to my taste," he said. "There ought to be a man fishing in that stream, for it evidently has fish in it. There are other improvements I gycld. suggest, too." S^j^^alu'a.vs "blamed myself for not telhngESns^ much it meant to Tom in relation to the future, but I think I hardly appreciated just how it was myself, and I laughed at Hugh's criticism in view of the fact that a desperate encounter was taking place on the shore of the stream, and admonished him lightly not to touch it if he didn't want to bring a hornet's nest VlIC At another time he descanted upon its merits as a drop curtain, and this time Tom was present, and I was astonished at th>- expression on his face. I believe J then conceived for the first time how utterly wrapped up he was in his undertaking. Hugh came back from Grierson's shortly after this to remain for some time, and he got to spending so much of his time at Dr. Thornborough's that 1 began to feel a little apprehensive, for Hugh was a fascinating fellow and o ivnrtKr nrie t.r>r> nnrl Tnm sppmprl as if he could do nothing toward winning Annie until that everlasting picture was done. I think he intended the picture i to win her at one grand sweep, as it j would win him fame and fortune. ; Hugh's visits grew more frequent, and j he walked and rode with Annie in the October evenings until I thought it my duty to warn Tom, but he was serene as any of the lovely autumn days that i uj One night toward the latter part of the month he came to me, his eyes all aglow with excitement that was almost insanity, and whispered : " I think one more evening will be the last on the picture, and then I am going to show it to her, and I am going to tell her what I have kept locked up in my breast, and tell what has inspired me j to do the work." " Success, my dear old friend," said j I, as I shook his hand and retired with ! an irrelevant yawn?something that 1j am ashamed of to this day. 'JLom ciosea xne aoors uxiu wur&eu i alone the next evening, and I don't I think he retired at all that night. Coming in rather late the next after-! noon I found Hugh occupying the J same position in front of the picture in which I had surprised him on the other occasion, with the brush again in his hand. I glanced involuntarily at the picture and then started back with horror. This is what I saw : a man as large as a dozen of the soldiers, holding a ftshing-pole much longer than any tree on the canvas, appeared sit-1 tin<r serenelv on ton of the mountain ! angling in the river. The face bore a j rude resemblance to Tom's, and the ef- i feet was grotesque in the extreme. ; After accomplishing this Hugh had J turned his attention to the battle scene in the foreground, and had executed a gross caricature of the goddess of liberty towering between the opposing i forces and composing "peace in the; name of Hugh O'Xeill" by means of a I streamer issuing from her lips. Her {lowing robes had completely obliterated several of the central figures of the piece upon which poor Tom had de- i voted his greatest skill. has accented me. Fred, and I i ? 1 , -- - - , feel uncommonly hilarious this evening, i "Won't Tom swear?" I glanced at him savagely. " Who has accepted you ? you scoundrel! you villain! You?you?. It will kill Tom, sure." I actually wept with mingled pity ; and rage. "Who? "Why, who should it be, j but Annie?" The defacement of the picture be- i came a secondary consideration in a ; moment. I picked up something that I mv hand touched?I believe it was j a * chair?with the intention, 11 think, of throwing it at him, I with a kind of idea of protecting Tom, but my arm fell powerless at my side for jit. that moment Tom himself opened the door and entered the room { with Annie upon his arm?Tom with ; such a look of supreme happiness upon j his face as I shall never see again. He j looked at me and said: I ' I.-"'-- . .. " Please uncover it, Fred." I choked down completely and dropped into a chair. I tried not to look at him when he saw the picture, but I couldn't help it. I expected him to cry out?to kill Hugh?something, I scarcely knew what What lie did was to look at the picture, and then from me to O'Xeiil, with an expression that made my very soul dissolve with pity. His gaze rested a moment on Hugh, and gradually he comprehended. I somehow expected to see Hugh wither under the look, but his eyes were upon Annie. He went toward her presently, and what you saw in their faces finished the blow. Tom started toward me and then turned and went up to the picture and drew the calico cover softly over it as he would have drawn the pall over the face of the dead; walked slowly to Annie and Hugh and said with the sweetest expression, "I am glad you are happy," and went out of the room. He went 'down into his mother's chamber that night, and when I next saw him it was at the close of another day, and he came into the yard with his old white overalls and jacket on and a paint-bucket in his hand. He had been at work as usual. He never stretched another canvas. I know that his forgiveness of Hugh was complete, and that he took up the burdens of life again patiently, and therein lies his sublimity. If you care to know anything further of me, know that I am taking care of Tom's sister as my wife. As for Hugh and Annie they are happy, for they never knew how they had wrecked Tom's life.?Frederick E. Shephard. Spoopendyke as a Farmer. "This," said Mr. Spoopendyke, as he gazed around on his new acquisition of six acres?" this, ray dear, is what I have always wanted. A farm and a farmer's life are the highways to happiness. Mrs. Spoopendyke, don't you think so." " It's perfectly lovely," rejoined Mrs. Spoopendyke. " I was born on a farm and was always healthy, though I had to go a good ways for water." "I'll fix that, my dear," returned Mr. Spoopendvke. "I'll bring the water. Xow, where are my agricultural reports ? I must plant right off if we are going to have crops, and when they are ripe we'll take them to market." " I see the report says you naist give your hen chopped turnip once in a while," said Sirs. Spoopendvke, putting her thumb on the paragraph. " Either that or cabbages," returned her husband. " I don't know whether we'll have cabbages enough," he continued, musingly. " You might have less buckwheat," suggested Mrs. Spoopendvke. " I should think, though, that two acres would be enough for one hen ; and if it isn't, you can buy a load now and then from the neighbors." " I'll think that over," replied Mr. Spoopendvke. " Here's one thing certain I don't understand. It says we should test a few seed before planting, to be sure they will germinate ; but it don't say how to do it." "Maybe it means to boil them," suggested Mrs. Spoopendyke; or perhaps you? " " Oh ! perhaps you think it means to crack 'em with an ax to see if they are hard ! I s'pose you've got an idea you stick straws into 'em to see if they're done ! Well, you don't; you put acid on 'em. I'll "get some acid and drop 'em in ; and if it discolors 'em they're no good, and if it don't they're all right. I think "\ve ought to have some weevil for the pig." " I don't know where you're going to plant it," said Mrs. Spoopenclyke, " unless it will grow with buckwheat or onions. You can't put it in with the cabbage, because the pig and hen would fight." " Don't you know what weevil is ?" demanded Mr. Spoopendyke, glaring at his wife. " Got a notion it is some kind of weed for the pig to smoke, haven't you? Imagine its gilt-edge note paper with a monogram for you to write on, don't you ? Well, it isn't a swallow-tail coat or a plug hat for him to go to church in, neither! You don't plant weevil, Mrs. Spoopenayke, any more than you do soap, clothespins or stair-rods. You buy it in barrels, and I'll order some." "I think we ought to have some lace curtains for the front windows," suggested Mrs. Spoopendyke, anxious to change the conversation. "Yes, and we want a folding bedstead for the cow, and we've got to have a new arm-chair for the pig, and I'm afraid those cabbages won't do without a wet nurse!" squealed Mr. Spoopendyke. " I suppose I've got to hire a man to see that the meadow don't go fishing on Sundays and upset your religious notions. Oh, you're a farmer's wife, you are! If I had time to write an index to you and get some dodgasted binder to fit you up and with a fly-leaf, you'd make a whole agricultural report." And Mr. Spoopendyke shot into the house and to bed, while his wife, having put all the oil lamps into buckets of water so they couldn't explode during the night, fell asleep, dreaming that the cabbage patch had eloped with the onions, while the cow and the pig had died of weevil, and the windmills had abandoned agricultural pursuits and started off through Ohio preaching the gospel.?Brooklyn Eagle. The Edelweiss. The curious and interesting Alpine plant, edelweiss, which travelers in Switzerland have so often carried awav for its local and poetic associa tions, and have as uniformly failed in the attempt to cultivate it, has at last been reduced to cultivation by an English gardener. lie treats the plant as a biennial, and raises a batch of seedlings every year. This year the seed was ripe July 25, and was immediately sown in a peat soil covered with a little silver sand. Ordinary seed pans were used. In a fortnight many seedling plants were above the surface and growing satisfactorily. The soil in the seed pans is kept moist, and the plants well shaded from the sun under the plant stage of a greenhouse. The young plants are kept in the pans all winter, then pricked off singly into small pots in March. In May they are planted out in a rock garden, where they grow freely and bloom profusely. Sandstone appears tc suit the edelweiss well; the roots seem, to fasten themselves to it and produce vigorous plants. A position in the open sun appears to be best suited, in England, to the wellbeing of the plant. In tills country more shade would probably be necessary. The demand for edelweiss has been so great among travelers in the Alps that several cantons have prohibited * ? ? f -fl 1 -L _ T X it ~1 1J me saie 01 ine pianos, lest- iney suuuiu be entirely exterminated. Kossuth recently celebrated the eighty-first anniversary of his birth, and the thirty-third of his condemnation to death as a traitor. WW I? c???r???J??an ' Newspaper Isdixors ana Tiieir twa. j Xewspaper editors a.re personages ; | "with whom, in the mind of the public ; | at large, there has always been asso- i | ciated a certain degree of mystery. There is no class of men whose work ; : passes so directly and so constantly be-: j fore the public eye; yet there are few | i with regard to whose real position and functions more vague, com used or erroneous notions are entertained, even i on the part of persons otherwise well j informed. This is no doubt largely due j to the anonymity which is preserved in the newspaper press of this country. Headers come" to identify the opinions of a particular organ more with the sheet of printed paper, and with its distinctive name and features, than : with the individual or individuals by 1 whom it is directed, and of whom, it may be, they know nothing. The power and influence, with their I _ i i i r _ .1 1 ; auencunt responsiointy, exercisea oy | the editors of our great newspapers are j enormous. Thomas Carlyle once described journalists as the true kings and priests of the nation. The office so described is a most attractive one for young men in search of a career, especially if they be fairly educated and believe they are imbueci with the fire of genius. The commonest mistake of such aspirants to the editorial chair is that they greatly underestimate the attainments requisite for such a position. They speak of "taking to journalism " as if it were a very simple matter, to be accomplished without | much personal trouble or inconven! ience, and never thinking of tha long j years of patient work and varied ex] perience which will have to be underi gone before they can reach the I r>r?inf t.ViAv Vinvr> in viaw. .Tnnrnnl I ism is now, and is becoming more so j every year, a profession for which a | special training is required. There j j have been instances in which men of i brilliant parts and profound erudition j have proved signal failures in the edi- j ! torial chair; while men of inferior ! education and meaner intellectual powers, but with those indispensable qualifications?tact, judgment and experience?have succeeded admirably under the same conditions. It is, therefore, quite erroneous for a young man to suppose becausc he has the advantage of a good education, writes with facility, and has a notion of such work, he can " take to journalism" and surmount all difficulties, as it were, I with a pair of seven-league boota. Some years ago a j'oung man wrote j to an American paper that he wanted j to be an editor; and the reply which he | received is well worth producing here. " Canst thou," asked the editor,"" draw up leviathan with a hook thou lettest down? Canst thou hook up great ideas from the depths of thine intellect, and clean, scale and fry them at five minutes' notice ? Canst thou write editorials to measure? Canst thou write an editorial to fit in a three-quarter column of the paper, which shall be in length just twenty-two inches, having three inches of fine sentiment, tour inches | for the beginning, and nine inches of J l\n?? '?> A *Vk i / ! /II A AM/1 A AnfVM17*of I IIULLIUI J.U tUC lUlUUl^, ctiiU. UH vuiwuion of maxim and precept, six inches long, at the close?1' This will, of course, be regarded as a hit cf facetious exaggeration on the pare of the editor, and no doubt it was; but it really reflects certain necessary phase*! in the work of a.journalist. Important intelligence frequently arrives at the newspaper office within a short time of the paper going to press, and if the editor wishes to be up sides or ahead of his contemporaries, as most editors do, he must have a leading a:rtiflp rm t.hp snhierf. in the sams issiift as that in which the news appears. There is not a moment to be lost; indeed, there may be scarcely time to perform the "mere mechanical operation of writing what has to be said; not to speak of hunting about for an idea, or appropriate quotation, or a choice form of expression. These must all, in the langua ;e of the American editor, be hooked up, cleaned, scaled and fried without delay.?Chambers' Journal. Nihilists Hoodwinked. Carious stories, based on the alleged fear o~ the czar to show himself ic public, are by no means rare, but the following account of one of his majesty's subterfuges for eluding the danger of a Nihilist attack is, perhaps, the most amusing of any that have been published. It emanates from a correspondent of the Paris Intransijeant. The inhabitants of St. Petersburg were lately excited at the news of a very unexpected event. It was stated that the emperor had at hist made up his mind to come to St. Petersburg. He had been seen with only a small escort :.n an open caleehe on the .X ewski Perspective. People have become so unaccustomed to regard bt. retersburg as an imperial residence that, in spite of the assertions of the newspapers, no one at first placed any credit in the report. The next day, however, the czar's promenade was reueated, and even incredulous people were convinced. His majesty's partisans went into ecstacies and exclaimed: "You see that Alexander III. is no coward, as pnomipc! nrft.priH " Alas t tho. illn sions of the faithful and the wonder of the populace were of short duration. It soon transpired that it was not the emperor who was seated on the cushions of the caleche, but a wax figure clad in the imperial uniform, its face bearing a wonderful resemblance to the features of the sovereign. The czar's consent to this mockery had been obtained by ingenious officials, who pointed out that his cowardice was daily becoming more evident to the people, and that it was absolutely necessary to redeem liis fallen prestige. Alexander gave in to these arguments and the figure was made in sccrei;. It is a nerfect likeness, and the move- i ments of the head to the right and to j the left complete the illusion. At the I sight of the masterpiece the czar is i said to have embraced Tolstoi, exclaiming: "At last I can show myself to the nation without fear of the ter| rorists; let them blow up my carriage if they dare." A Terrible Death. Rather than suffer unrequited affec| tion men and women are constantly i determining to die. One of the most | dramatic among recent cases is re! ported in the St. Fetersburgh gazettes. | The story is that a young man of coni spicuous talents, excellent character ! and fine position, became attached to | a charming young lady who could not ; return his advanc es. Foreseeing that ! his passion must be hopeless, he re; solved on self-destruction. Then, fearing that he might be misunderstood, and in order to assure his friends of his entire sanity, he wrote to his parents the motives that impelled him to choose this course. " Her love," he said, "is simply indispensable to my life. I die like a fish without water: like a creature of God without air, I cannot do otherwise." In order to test his conviction to the ' utmost, the wretched man fixed upon ; a deliberate method of suicide, so that he might have every temptation and I everv onDortunitv to recant. lie en gaged a room in one of the city hotels and arranged three candies under the bedstead in such a way that while he i was reclining the flames might slowly i consume his back, until the spine car bonized and death resulted. Under I this excruciating torture he did not j blench, as the position of his body i when discovered proved. Gold in Tiny Bits, f-' In the manufacture of '^welry the tiniest bits of the preciousisnetals are gathered with the greatest care. -After particles of gold have becjpme imperceptible to the naked eye^-o^ans are adopted by which they axe-"accumulated, remelted and worked .over again. In some of the large factories, where gold is handled in larger quantities, special iloors are made. /0he flooring is double and made of tttfc best material, and has laid betwesjfthe upper and lower sections aspllalt paper, covered with tar. Minute.particles of gold find their way between, the seams of the upper section and Immediately adhere to the sticky tar. It' is calculated that when the floor of "a jeweler's shop is removed the gold" accumulated in the crevices and such places will mure uia.ii pav me ux. a new one. Every possible-^particle of filing, scraping, grinding^; polishing dust or engraving chips is'preserved for the assayer with as mueir scrupulous care as the shipping ofitfre goods from which they had bee~?;dptached. The wheels upon which g<Kd and- silver have been polished, worn out, are bunted and the 2re reveals particles of the precious metals which were mauen to an out me cuennsc. Sweepings are quite valuable and would be a material loss to the manufacturer if not saved, even alter the workman has picked up every bit of metal that may have fallen on the floor. This dirt from the floor will sell for seventy dollars a barrel. A Jersey City firm deal in this peculiar dirt almost exclusively. The caps of the workmen are often burned, as are the aprons, after they have been washed regularly every week. It has happened that $23 worth of gold was obtained by the burning of an apron. Even the water in which the workmen wash, in j tne majority oi piuces, issuveu cuuu j.uli into tanks, whore it is allowed to stand for a time, a sediment forming at the bottom. The water, is run off and the muddv mixture handed iOver to the assaver. The men often find little chips of gold and silver :.n their hair or beard, but these do not amount to anything if not accumuhtted. It is told of a Swiss watch case maker how he had a way of incessantly stroking his beard while polishing the causes, and parties interested discovered that when he got home at night he as carefully and incessantly brushed out his bes.rd, but saved thebrushings.?Brooklyn Eagle. A Duel With llorsewhins. A novel duel took place in Harmony Grove, Jackson county, Gta.n a short time since, between Mr. Hill arid W. I. Goss. Ilill was the challenger, and Goss said he didn't care t<? fight him with deadly weapons, but if Hill would not be satisfied any other way h i would fight him with buggy whips. The distance and other rules to <sovijrn the fight were made, new buggy whips were procured and the parties loedthe mark, about five feet apart, and operations commenced. The battle ground was in front of Freeman's livery stable, in the heart of the town,' and it was not long until the most of 1,he citizens of the place were looking on at a safe distance. Xo one had interfered and the combatants were making steady and regular licks upon each other without flinching, and the strokes of the whip could be heard several U1UCt\.S UVV Civ, <XO Ulioj r?cxxu n luuiiug through the air and upon the bicks 01 the two men. Occasionally one or the other would baclc a little from his line, but he would soon come up again to the scratch. Whenever they got tired one would call out to hold up for a while and they would take a blowing spell, and when rested they would go at it again. The fight continued for ovef three hours, with short intervals for rest. After the second round Hill, who had no covering on his back except a shirt, insisted that Goss should pull off his coat, which he did, and they took both hands to their whips and went to work. By this time the news of the fight had spread all over the town; some of the merchants closed t!i< ir stores and business was eenerallv suspended to see what would be the result of the encounter. After they had worn out sevea dollars' worth of buggy whips and were completely tired down they agreed to quit, and Hill told Goss that he was satisfied. From parties who saw Hill's back we learn that there was not a place on it th at you could place a silver quarter without touching the welts that the whip had made, and he was marked all over in the same way. "We learn that Goss was not hurt quite so bad, and was able to bfe out the next day, but Ilill had to lay up, and it was rumored over this way that he was seriously sick.?Jackson Herald. Brain Stimulation. Dr. Breunlun writes in the Contemporary Review: The anatomist is familiar with the fact that there are two large nerves of sensation known as the "fifth pair," which are distributed to the top of the head and face, and the mucous membrane of the mouth, nose and eyes. These nerves are closely connected with the nerves which control the action of the heart anrl nf the blood vessels. Bv their stimulation the heart's action may be increased. This explains the fact that application of cold water or cold air to tiie face is one of the best means of reviving a'person who has fallen in yncope. It is a curious fact that the ;'"ople of all nations are accustomed, when in any difficulty, to stimulate one or another branch of the fifth nerve, and quicken their mental processes. Thus some persons, when puzzled, scratch their heads; others rub their foreheads, and others stroke or pull their beards, thus stimulating the occipital frontal or mental branches of these nerves. "Manv Germans, when think ing, have a habit of striking their lingers against their noses, and thus stimulating the nasal cutaneous branches, while in other countries some people stimulate the branches distributed to the mucous membrane of the nose by taking snufF. The late Lord Durby, when translating Homer, was accustomed to eating brandy cherries. One man will eat figs while composing a leading article; another will suck chocolate creams, others will smoke cigarettes, and others sip brand v anti water. By these means they stimulate the lingual and buccal branches of the nerve, and thus reflexly excite their brains. Alcohol appears to excite circulation through the brain reliexly from the mouth, and to stimulate the heart reflexly from the stomach, even before it is absorbed into bloou. Shortly after it has been swallowed, however, it is absorbed from the stomach and passes with the blood to tiie heart, to the brain, and to the other parts of the nervous system, upou which it begins to act directly. It takes thirty-five pounds of sugar to sweeten the average inhabitant of the United States a year, or about 1,750,000,000 pounds to sup- i ply the whole country for twelve ' months. AMUStt TH? SJtALtES. ?fcwf?undlanil's Unique Industry ? The Massacre of a Herd and Its Revolting Sights?Habits and Qualities of the Hunters. A St. John's (X. F.) correspondent of the Xew York Evening Post writes: Among the many strange industries of the world that exact from men hardihood, persistence and daring, scarcely one compares with the pursuit of the ^v:i ~ IIr T V -1 ? 1 uju seui, a cmmig, i oeneve, now suostantially monopolized bv the Newfoundlanders. The seal here referred to must, at the outset, be distinguished from the fur seal of Alaska, whose soft coat makes warm the heart of the city belle in exact proportion as the face of paterfamilias grows blue and his pocketbook thin. The creature sought by the Newfoundlander yields only oil and a coarse grained but expensive leather; he comes down on the ice from the far Arctic every spring, and soon after the breeding period, which begins about the middle of March, the fierce hunt for him opens, lasting until about the end of April. How important this industry is to Newfoundland mav^ be conceived of from the fa^xuat jfobirt 6,000 men eagege* 1T\ if* ?>0/">V? p/iOcAn of Cf TrtKn'o olnnA J.XJ. ?v vUVl 1 cvaouu CXU rj UlUU. O aiuuv,, while the annual exports of seal products reach a value of more than $1,000,000. Xext to the omnipresent codfish, the seal is the commercial staple of Newfoundland, and deprived of the animal the islanders would be forced to bridge a terrible gap of semi-starvation and poverty. The life of the seal, or "sivoil," as the Newfoundlanders call him, is |a most curious career of variety and change. Little can be said of the mysteries of his winter life, which is passed far up on the edges of the lower Arctic zone or ice, wmcn, Dreaicmg away m early spring, floats southward on the Labrador sea-current. Their gregarious habit then brings the seals together in immense numbers, and old sealers tell of having seen dozens of acres of ice so thickly covered that the creatures could scarcely move. As the ice drifts into melting latitudes the troops of seals disperse. Where they (Td is nnrprtflin prpp-nf. t.hnt. n fpw tered wanderers swim southward along the coasts of the United States as far as the Delaware river. The breeding period begins about the middle of March, after the ice has floated to a point some six hundred miles north of St. John's, the f em ale seal bringing forth her single young on the hummocks. Then occurs a most extraordinary phenomenon. The young at birth -weigh about five pounds. In fifteen days they weigh forty or fifty, gaining sometimes as much as five pounds in twenty-four hours. Nature furnishes the " whitecoat," as the baby seal is called, an oily coating of blubber just beneath the skin, which in ten days thickens from half an inch to three inches or four. The young seal during this period of astonishing development lives on its "mother's milk and on animalcule which it sucks from the pores of the thin drift-ice. The seal fishermen have half a dozen names for the seals at various stages of growth. They are, "white-coats/' "harps" (from a dark harp-shaped mark upon the back), " bedlamers," "hoods" and "doghoods," according to age. The doghood is the old male seal, which is 'equipped with a thick skin on the head and neck. When attacked, the doghood resists fiercely, and the hardest blow makes no impression on the tough integument the animal draws up in folds so as to completely cover the forehead and nose. The sailing of the seal fleet from St. John's early in March is the momentous event of the year. All through the long winter, shut in by deep snows, living in utter idleness and depressed by chill poverty, the fisherman has eked out an existence most miserable onrl mnnntnnftus On thA Int. nf March the sailing vessels leave for the northward "to meet the ice," as the phrase goes. They are allowed twelve days' start of the sealing steamers, which go on the 12th of March every year. These steamers are stanch craft, some of them so large as to be of 800 tons register. Their bows are ironplated against the thick ice which they must often penetrate to reach the breeding-grounds of the seal. They are crowded with sealers, not unfrequently carrying as many as 250 men, "sardined" three in a bunk scarcely the same number of feet wide. Altogether some twenty of these steam vessels, with 3,000 hands, leave the harbor almost simultaneously. The wharves are crowaeci, nags nuicer in the breeze, and saluting cannon roar their sonorous farewells. Now the four or five days' voyage to meet the southward-moving ice begins. Keen watchmen on the masts keep watch for the first sign of a seal herd. The superstitious sealers greet as a happy omen the finding of a solitary baby "white-coat"' on a strip of ice. Some of them kill the creature, and, like the ancient augurs, examine the entrails, professing to know occult signs showing the direction in which the seal herd must be sought. Others say that the direction of the baby seal's nose when first seen proves where the herd is, and still others take on board the baby and keep it alive "for luck." Ere long, if good fortune follows the craft, the seals are sighted. The steamer runs into the broad ice fields, the deck covered with excited men waiting the signal to disembark. The 1UC, pel naps, is tuvacu ivi nau ci square mile with the young seals, fifteen days old, incapable of taking to the water, and watched by father and mother seals, who never desert their young in extremity. Another moment, and 200 wild men, armed with long staves, are over the sides, and the slaughter opens. A scene follows which even hardened sealers describe as piteous. A blow on the nose stuns the young seal. Then, drawing a sharp knife, the sealer, with wonderful celerity, rips open the skin and blubber, pulls out the gory carcass, and leaves both on the ice to take another victim. The seals have a cry almost exactly like a human being, and tears like those of mortals fall from tiieir eyes. Their wild wailings, the piteous attempts of the mothers to shield their young, the bloody ice, the quivering carcasses crawling often some distance before life is extinct, and the shouts of the ol-r* o fliof 1 ujfrrrooil limrvu tt wikic uv,p^ui .j un description. Tlie massacre done, the "pelts," as the hides with the attached blubber are technically called, are put on board the steamer, which, if not loaded, begins search for a new and fresh butchery. Only the young seals are killed on this first voyage, as their pelts are proportionately more valuable, and the old seals can be left for a second venture later in the season. These sealing voyages are either immense successes or most costly failures. Tens ot tnousancis 01 aonars are neeaea to equip the vessels, which sometimes return without a solitary pelt. But the profits of one good voyage compensate for several bad ones. The pelts fetch in some years as much as four dollars each, and instances are recorded where morn than 40,000 have b*en brought in by a single steamer. [ A ifcotley and curious lot are the j men who for a few weeks in the year | hunt the seal; Stalwart in frame,- used | to the sea until they have absolute con' tempt of its terrors, bold in adventures ! i on the treacherous ice-floes, and mar- j velously skilled in seal lore, they make : ! up a body of men not to be matched on the globe. Crowded like pigs on a sealing steamer, they cultivate a posij tive affection for dirt, and regard it as ! a kind of honorable badge of their ad I venturous calling. During a voyage j : of several weeks they never take off j their clothes, even to sleep. The oil from sea blubber fairly drips from their garments, dirt, soot and tar adhere to their faces in steadily thickening j strata, and when they finally enter port to strut the streets in unwashed glory they are incarnate emblems of tilth and odor. A night in St. John's after , the arrival of two or three lucky seal crews means bedlam for the city. Honest burghers fly the streets and look well to the doors and shutters o' nights. On the ice the endurance, surefootedness and daring of the seal hunters are well-nigh .incredibly They leap from cake 'to^feke even where it seems even a child could not be sustained, drag their heavy boats long distances through the hummocks, and think nothing of passing a night on the ice far from the steamer, provided only seal are near. Their cold hands they warm by thrusting them in gashes cut in the still palpitating carcass of the seal, and one instance is recorded where a freezing sealer saved his life by heaping up the ! ornrv rarrrtczpa frtv a niorlit. awt Viic n-orn body. When hunting, the sealers go by twos so that one can aid his companion should he fall in the water between the floes. The flippers of the seal, by the way, when fried are reckoned a rare dainty by the islanders, and are often brought back from the ice in long strings to be kept for food. When, as rarely happens, more seals are found than a single steamer can load, the surplus are killed and the pelts heaped on the ice, to be marked with the steamer's flag. In that case an unloaded vessel can bring in the pelts and demand a certain large percentage of their value. On their second voyage out the steamers seek the full grown animals, which weigh some zUU pounds. They are fierce fellows, who force their way to the water and have to be shot, making the process of collecting pelts slow and unprofitable as compared with the capture of a new-born herd. When the steamers arrive the pelts are unloaded and transferred to the oil factories which line the eastern border of St. John's harbor. The blubber is separated from the pelt to be tried into oil, which is used for lubricating, fine soaps and a dozen other purposes. The skins are salted, then sent to Europe, where they are tanned into coarse but handsome leather, particularly beautiful for its graining, and worked up for ' purses, costly bookbinding and like : uses. The Cause of His Absence. "Will he bite?" The humming of the bees as they sped from flower to flower and sipped j the honeyed treasures of petal and j calyx, and the low murmur of the sumi mer breeze sighing among the locust I trees were the only sounds that broke ; the St. Louis silence of a beautiful i nft.prnr>nn in Spnt.pmhpr Thp arnhpr i haze of Indian summer had fallen upon i the land, and from the vivid hues of j the sumac bush to the pale gray of the : abandoned hoopskirt every object that ! lay so silently upon the brown bosom j of the sun-kissed earth was touched j with the withering hand of autumn. Away to the westward stretched a vista of grain fields that were laughing in the golden glory of an abundant harvest, while the eastern landscape j was flecked here and there by a sadeyed but brindle cow. " T,pf. no think onlv of the future. : ! Kupert," said Beryl Gilhooly to the j | strong limbed, all-on-account-of-Eliza | : young man who stood by her side, j looking down into the hazel depths of j ' her beautiful eyes in a wistful, will-! the-old-man-ever-go-to-bed expression i that sat so strangely upon the Chicago i outlines of his pure young face. And j even while speaking these words she ; ! turned her left foot slightly, so as to j shield him from the ardent rays of the sun, and smiled a joyous, happy, youare-first-choice-in-every-pool smile that ! told of the deathless passion that en-1 j slaved her soul. " Let us think of the I i Pnfiiro " olio (wntinnod* " nf t.hp hrirrht ! | and happy future, full of matinee tick- { ' ets and ice cream." " Xo, no, not that, some other I future," cried Kupert Mcintosh, a look j | of haunting horror coming into his face, j | " I cannot free my mind from this ; : dread suspicion." At that moment a book agent was j seen ascending the brow of a hill. He | ! entered the portals of Coastcliff Castle j j and went up the front steps. In a | little while he came back hurriedly, i unu suuu a w<w on ?*iwu j some gents' furnishing goods. Rupert i | kissed Beryl and started over town. | " "When are you coming back, sweet- i ! heart ?" the girl asks. " Xext August," are the words that j the zephyrs bear back to her. " Why do you wait so long, darling ?" j " Because," he answers, in tear-; stained tones, " dogs are muzzled in I August."?Chicago Tribune. A Remarkable Burglar. Af.irv Morris, a netite fourteen-vear- i old girl, with a remarkably sweet face, which seemed to beam with childlike ! innocence, was sentenced at Chicago j to two years in the house of correc-! 1 tion, she having pleaded guilty to four-j | teen indictments for burglary and lar-j 1 ceny. The judge remarked that it was | j one of the most astounding cases of j which he had ever heard. This girl is j ! the most remarkable burglar of mod- j j ern times, x or uie past two years sue | | has plied lier vocation, committing in-1 ; numerable daring burglaries by night j | and well nigh fdling the house of her j : parents with dress goods, jewelry, dia- : monds and articles valued in all at $10,- J 000. A large part of the plunder had j been disposed of, the revenue supplying j the entire family wants. Eight hun dred indictments could have been j found. The story of her crimes and escapades would till a ponderous vol- j umc. Her mother, Helen Morris, was i sentenced to three and a half years in the penitentiary as an accessor}'. ? . Underground Life in England. According to Des Monties, the pro- j posed tunnel under the English clian- i nei lias icu to some siausiicai inquiries | which have shown that the number of j persons in Great Britain who are en-! gaged in underground employment is ' ! '378,151. The length of the galleries I in which their labors are carried on is j not less than o$,744 miles. TheJ greatest depth of the channel is 180 ; feet, and the lowest part of the tun- j nel will not be over 200 feet below the ; 1 surface. The greatest depth of the j coal mines is about 2,800 feet and the j least is about 300 feet. The channel j : tunnel will only form about one-! thirtieth of one per cent, of the total j I subterranean excavations. ; 81r Garnet Wolseley's Wounds. Sir Garnet "Wolselev has seen much hard service and has profited by it, A few incidents of his early career will show the school in wliich he was trained. His first battlefield was in Bur mall, in 1853. At the beginning of March, 1853, he j arrived at Donabew by sea, and on the \ 7th of the month went under fire in the operations against Myat4oon, a noted Burmese leader. On March 19 i Myat-toon's stronghold was success fully stormed. The first attack was repulsed with some loss. Ensign Wolseley was well in front of his men and had reached within twenty yards i of the hostile works, when suddenly i the earth gave way beneath his feet ! 3 1 ? J T_ ? _ J. A.1- _ i ana ne iouiiq nimseu at me ooivom ul , a concealed pit with a stake in it. \ When his men were beaten back he j was in great danger, but he managed ! to escape without even a wound, though much shaken by the fall. A second attack being decided on, the commanding officer of the Eightieth called for an officer to lead a storming party from that regiment. Ensign Wolseley at once stepped to the front, and hastily collecting such of his own men as were at hand, made a rush up the narrow path by which only the enemy's works could be reached. Another detachmeDt had been sent on the same dangerous business from the Fifty-first regiment. It was led by Lieutenant Taylor, who raced with Ensign "Wolseley for the honor of being the first man in. Only two could move aureast, hllu. me gaiiant yuuug uiuueia i evidently rushed on their destruction. Both were shot in the thigh. Taylor bled to death in a few minutes, but Wolseley, pressing his fingers on the arteries of his thigh, checked the flow j of blood. Greviously wounded and I lying helpless on the ground, Wolseley waved his sword and cheered his men on to the assault, which this time was successful. When he first fell, some of his men offered to carry him to the rear, but he refused all assistance till the position had been taken. After i several months of suffering and danger ! he was sent home on sick-leave. Wolseley's regiment sailed from ; Dublin on November 19, 1854, and ; landed at Balaklava on December 4 j of that year. On August 30, he I was assisting some sappers to fill with j stones some gabions which the Kus- ! sians had upset just before a sortie, j when a round shot dashed into the middle of the group. He had just ; time to cry, "Look out!" when j the whole party lay prostrate j oil the ground. The round shot had j struck a gabion, scattering the stones with resistless force. One of the sappers had his head trken off and his companion was disemboweled. Both were killed instantly, and "VTolseley himself, lying by their side senseless and covered with blood, seemed 'also a j corpse. A sergeant of sappers finding | that he still breathed picked him up, j and after a time he recovered suffi- ] ciently to be able with the help of the | sergeant and Prince Victor, of Hohen- j lohe, to stagger as far as the doctor's ! hut.. He then sank exhausted and i half-unconscious. Prince Victor asked | the doctor to look at him. He did so, j and curtly saying, "He's a dead 'un," | was about to attend to other patients, i Wolseley roused, and irritated by j this cool way of dismissing him to the j other world, turned round and said: j " I'm worth a good many dead men yet!" an opinion which was confirmed when he received the doctor's attention. A detailed examination showed that if not dead, he was very severely wounded. The doctor's report stated that his features were not distinguishable as those of a human being, while blood flowed from innumerable wounds j caused by stones with which he had j been struck. Sharp fragments were ; imbedded all over his face and his left j cheek had been almost cut away. Both eyes were completely closed, and the iniurv to one of them was so serious that the sight had been permanently lost. Xot a square inch of his face but what was battered and cut about, while his body was wounded all over, just as if he had been peppered with small shot. He had received also a severe wound on his right leg, so that both limbs had now been injured, the wound in the left thigh, received in Eurmah, rendering him slightly lame. After the surgeon had dressed his wounds, Captain Wolseley was placed rt/3 Virr on a atrtitciici miu uaincu uj JLVUI soldiers to St. George's monastery, situated on the sea-coast, not far from Balaklava, and there he passed som? weeks in a cave, as the sight of both eyes was too much injured to subject them to the light. How Animals Play. Small birds chase each other ab eut in play, but perhaps the conduct of the crane and the trumpeter is most oxtraordinary. The latter stands on one leg, hops around in the most eccentric manner, and throws somersaults. The A mpnVans it the mad bird, oil ae count of these singularities. -Water | birds, such as ducks and geese, dive alter each other, and clear the surface of the water with outstretched neck ! and flapping wings, throwing abundant j spray around. Deer often engage in j sham battle, or trial of strength, by 5 twisting their horns together and pushing for the mastery. All animals pretending violence in their play stop short of exercising it; the dog takes the orrAJit.pst. nre^ftiition not to iniure hv his bite; and the ourang-outang, in wrestling with his keeper, pretends to throw liim and make feints of biting him. Some animals carry out in their play the semblance of catching their prey. Young cats, for instance, leap after every small and moving object, even to the leaves strewed by the autumn wind. They crouch and steal forward ready for the spring, the body quivering and the tail vibrating with emotion; they bound on the moving leaf, and again spring forward to another. Benger saw young cougars and jaguars playing with round substances, like kittens. Birds of the magpie kind are the analogues 01 monkeys, iuuoi miscmei, play and mimicry. There is a story of a tame magpie that was seen busily employed in a garden gathering pebbles with much solemnity and a studied air, burying them in a hole made to receive a post. After dropping each stone it cried " Cur-ack" triumphantly, and set off for another. On examining the spot, a poor toad was found in the hole, which the magpie was stoning for his amusement. The Dead of China. In view of the myriads of human ! beings which have lived in China from i time immemorial, scientists say that I every ounce of soil must have passed through the bodies of human beings in ; that empire, not only once, but hun- ! dreds of times. China is a densely ! populated country and its records are j very, very ancient. If all born were [ still alive they would cover the country i completely and extend miles into the i air. It is a suggestive idea that the ; soil of every populous country must i represent the remains of myriads of i animated beings who once lived and | loved. ! WORDS OF WISD03T. '<$S? Few learn much from history who do not bring much with them to its || The bell never rings of itself; unless some one handles or moves it, it is Philosophy is a good horse in the stable, but an arrant jade on a Withour content we shall find it olmnot oa tn nleasc others as aiiuv.;</ ourselves. A life spent worthily should be ' measured by a nobler line, by deeds, f i not words. ' x'^f Argument in company is generally the worst of conversation, and in books the worst of reading. Most of the shadows that cross our path through lite are crossea oy buuiuing in our own light. Language is a revealer of character, and that which a man would conceal -M by his acts and manner he cannot hide in his words. When you are down-hearted and the ' JM world looks black to you, you ought to be hospitable enough to entertain a * ** * hope of better days. Good humor is the clear blue sky of the soul on which every star of talent *11 ??- ?* - ? -.1?"rViA enn . win snme more uican^, ?uu </w ouu _ "-~x> of genius encounters no vapors in its ^ passage. There is a secret pleasure in hearing ourselves praised; but, on such occasions, a worthy mincl will rather resolve to merit the praise than be puffed up by it. Truth comes to us from the past as gold is washed down from the mountains of Sierra Nevada, in minute but precious particles, and intermixed with infinite alloy, the debris of centuries. Happiness or misery is in the mind. It is the mind which lives; and the ^^ggKj length of life ought to be measured by the number and importance of our ideas, and not by the number of our days. Respect goodness, find it where you may. xlulloi uuciio hucicyw ;uu behold it unassociated with vice; but honor it most when accompanied with l|| exertions, and especially when exerted in the cause of truth and justice. Singular Contest in Beauty, Corpulence and Water iirinkingr. Among the special attractions of the festival of St. Stephen, Hungary's patron saint, recently celebrated at is Pesth,were prize competitions of beautiful girls, handsome men and pretty children, as well as of corpulent persons of either sex, and of water drinkers. The prize of beauty was won by Miss Cornelia Szekeley, the daughter of a servitor in the royal household, and it seems to be openly admitted by the members of the jury that she bore away the palm, from all her.fair competitors, not by superior loveliness, but by the extraordinary freshness and piquancy of her charms, chiefly consisting in a dazzling fair complexion, roguish hazel eyes and luxuriant dark brown hair, lier portraits win published as soon as a surpassingly "fetching" costume, in which she has made up her mind to be photographed, sbaTj^^ave been complethe twin cities. MeanwBue^ffle prize?a massive gold bracelet, enriched with a full-blown rose in brilliants?has been publicly bestowed ubon her with great pomp and cere mony. The entrees for the corpulence prize were numerous, but two of the competitors so obviously excelled all the others, when paraded on the platform, that their rivals retired from the contest, and only Louisa Zorn and Andrew Scheil underwent the weighing test. The difference between them proving to be only one pound in favor /vf tttVia tnrnod thp af: VI. VU\> ACUSAJ II UV VUi. UVN* VUV ? ? twenty stone four pounds?the prize j. was divided between these remarkable specimens of professional obesity. As for the water-drinking competition, it was speedily settled. Police constable Xo. 517, the first candidate for the prize, contrived to swallow half a gallon of water in ten seconds; having witnessed which incomparable feat his would-be competitors withdrew from the struggle and left his claim to the prize undisputed. _ . :< "Uncle Sam" and "Brother Jonathan," The origin of the terms "Uncle Sam," applied to the United States government, and "Brother Jonathan," applied in* the first instance to the people of New England, and sometimes to the people of the whole country, or, rather, to the representative American, often proves a puzzle. The question how the terms arose is often asked. The following seems a correct answer : Alter w asmngton was appumueu. commander of the patriot army in the Revolution, he had great trouble in obtaining supplies. On one occasion, when no way could be devised by him and his officers to supply the wants of the army, "Washington wound up the conference with the remark, "We must consult Brother Jonathan." He referred to Jonathan Trumbull, then governor of Connecticut, in whose judgment he had confidence. Governor Trumbull helped the general out of his . difficulties, and afterward the expression used by Washington became a popular byword in the army and eventually a nickname for the nation. The name Uncle Sam, as applied to the United States, is said to have originated in the war of 1812. An in- ' soector of army provisions at Troy, named Samuel Wilson, was called by his workmen " Uncle Sam." One day somebody asked one of the workmen what the letters " U. S." printed on a cask meant. The workman replied that he supposed it must mean Uncle Sam. The joke was afterward spread in the army, and this, according to the historian Frost, was the origin of the sobriquet. A Cnrious Trade. One of the curious developments of trade in Southern California is the traffic in tarantulas and their nests. It is an entirely new avenue of trade, and to Mr. Leo Fleishman, of Los Angeles, seems to belong the honor of discovery and development, lie began a short time since to gather these curious and ingeniously-contrived nests for relichunters and curiosity-seekers, and as the trade increased he began the capture and preservation in a state of nature of tiie tarantula itself, which he -? ? does by injecting into the animal arsenic in considerable quantities. This has the effect of preserving the tarantula and destroying all its poison, and it may be handled with perfect impunity after such treatment. In cer tain localities tnese insects are quiws ? numerous, and the industrious hunter wi'l sometimes capture two dozen in a day, and these when prepared and nicely mounted bring six dollars per dozen. Mr. Fleishman has just filled an order for two dozen for the Denver exposition, now in session. He also has orders from Chicago, St. Louis and other Eastern cities, and several consignments have been sent direct to London.