Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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I DR. TALMABE'S SERMON. i I THE CHOICE OF A WIFE. ! Rev. Dr. Talmage preached at the BrookI lyn Tabernacle on Sunday, January 10, the first of a series of sermons ou the Marriage Ring, the subject being the "Choice of a Wire." After expounding a passage of Scripture Dr. Talmage took for nis text: Judges, xiv.3: "Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brethren, or among all my people that thou goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines?" Dr. Talmage said: Sampson, the giant, is hero asking consent of his father and mother to marriage with one CONFIRMED, A Big1 Day's Worn. lvone by the Senate in Executive Session. The United States Senate on the loth confirmed the following nominations: Diplomatic Service?Jal>ez L. M. Curry, of Richmond, to be minister to Spain; George V. N. Lathrop, of Michigan, to be minister to Russia; Charles L. Scott, of Alabama, to be minister resident and consul-general to Venezuela; Frederick H. Winston, of Illimois, to|be minister resident and consul-general to Persia: Pierce M. B. Younjr, of Geor fia. to be consul-general at St. Petersburg; M. H. Phelan, of Missouri, to be consul-general at Halifax: John B. Stalo, of Ohio, to be minister to Italy; Joseph L. Mor- j gan. of South Carolina, to be secretary of legation at Mexico; John E. Bacon, of South Carolina, to be charge d'affairs at Paraguay and Uruguay; Augustus Jay, of New \ ork, to be second secretary of legation at Paris; Moses A. Hopkins, of North Carolina, to be minister resident and consul-general to Liberia; John E. W. Thompson, of tNevr York, to be minister resident and consul-general to Hayti; Charles Denov, of Indiana, to be minister to China; Charles Denbv, Jr., of Indiana, to be second secretary of legation to China; William W. Rockhill. of Marylan d, to be secretary of legation at Pekin; William A. Stay, of Louisiana. to be minister resident and consul-general to Bolivia; James F. Lee, of Maryland, to be secretary of legation to Austria-Hungary: Walker Fearin, of Louisiana, to be minister resilient and consul-general to Roumania, Servia, and Greece. Department Officials?Robert A. Howard, of Arkansas, to be assistant attorney-general: Francis Wharton, of Pennsylvania, to be ex aminer of claims, department of state: Richard McMahon, of West Virginia, to be deputy second comptroller of tho treasury; James Q. Chenowith, of Texas, to be first auditor of the treasury; Wm. B. Webb, to be commissioner of the District of Columbia; Wm. H. Welch, of Maryland, to be deputy third auditor of the treasury. Pension Agents?Franz Sigel, at New York; Don Carlos Buell, at Louisville; Chas. A. Zollinger, at Indianapolis. Collectors of Internal Revenue?Wm. A. Beach, Twenty-first district of New York; Alexander Troup, district of Connecticut. United States Attorneys?Geo. N. Baxter, district of Minnesota; William C. Perry, district of Kansas. United States Marshals?Martin T. McMahon for the Southern district of NewYork, Albert A. Wilson for the District of Columbia. John W. Nelms for the Northern district of Georgia. Navy?Captain John G. Walker to be chief of the bureau of navigation, and cai> tain Montgomery Sicard to be chief of tiie bureau of ordinance of the navy, with the relative rank of commodore: Commodores , Stephen B. Luce and John Lee Davis to be rear admirals; Captains George E. Belknap, David B. Harmony, Andrew E. K. Benhain, to be commodores; Commanders Albert Kaiitz, Alfred T. | Maban, and George U. Kemey, to oe captains; Lieutenant-Commanders Benjamiu P. Lamberton, John Schouler, Francis W. Dickins, George F. F. "Wilde and Charles H. Davis, to bs commanders; Lieutenants William W. Reisinger, John C. Rich, William F. Burwell, John J. Hunker and Franklin Hanford, to be lieutenant-commanders. A large number of postmasters, Indiar agents, registers of land offices and receivers of public money were also confirmed. Among the postmasters confirmed wen these: John Foran, Lambertville, X. J.; Marj E. Simonsou, East Orange, N. J., and William H. Miller, Meriden, Conn. IN FAVOK OF THE MBTERS, Judge Thurman Decides the Hock" ing Valley Dispute Over AVages. Ex-United States Senator Allen G. Thurman, who was selected by the miners and operators' arbitration board of the Hocking Valley, to act as umpire in the recent troubles among them, has rendered his decision in favor of the miners. The price of mining in the Ohio Central and Hocking Valley districts has been in dispute between the operators and miners since the beginning of the strike on June 20, 1884. From the close of the strike until November 1, 1885, the price paid was fifty cents ? 4-An Tlmr tho mintiro nuif urnrL* wifn a Ho. a tVU. VJUl? " Vilk ?*.4.VUl*VAV mand for sixty cents a ton. The operators declined to pay this price, and stated that they were unable to do so without great loss. The operators and miners agreed to submit the matter to the arbitration of ten men, five to be selected by each party, and, in the event of their failure to agree, they were to select an eleventh man, i\;ho was to act as umpire and decide the matter. After careful consideration Mr. Thurman says: "My duty is simply to decide. To make elaborate argument is no part of it. It is sufficient for me to say that I have care- ! fully read the evidence and believe that I understand and remember it. The question is; Can the oj>erators of the two districts pay the advance asked and compete with other districts! Now considering the facts stated in the testimony, the amount of coal annually mined and the length of time that the trade has been carried on, it seems to me to "be fairly inferable that the business must iave been, on the whole, a profitable one. My decision, therefore, is that the operators of the two districts can pay the advance asked, sixty cents a ton, and compete with the other districts." Now everything is expected to be peaceful in the mining regions in the future. MOTHER NEGRO EXODUS, ! I Hundreds Leaving Southern States for the West. A Chattanooga (Tenn.) dispatch says that ^'another large party of negroes, numbering several hundred, passed through the city yesterday en route from the Carolinas to Arkansas. The exodus of negroes from the Carolinas, Georgia and Alabama to the West is increasing each week. Fully 1,000 have passed through this city in the past fortnight, and hundreds of others are making arrangements to leave as soon as possible. The movement is more general than ever before, and is produced chiefly by high rents, bad crops and the defective tenant system in this section of the South. The movement is beginning to be felt in all the States of the South, and is attracting widespread attention.11 BELOW ZERO. What the Thermometer Registered at Various Points. The thermometer at 7 o1clock a. m. of the 11th, registered below zero at the following points: Saranac Lake,ST. Y. 17 Milwaukee, Wis 2 Portland, Me 2 Duluth, Minn 15 Fork Smith, Ark . 4 St. Paul, Minn 22 Brownsville, Tex.. G Des Moines, Iowa..13 "XT 1 : 11 ~ TV O T\ A. T. ?/. iituvuv me. it* mi.... o i/avenpori,, lOwa..lO Indianapolis, IncL.10 Cairo, 111 <5 Cincinnati, Ohio... 11 Fort Garry, Minn..31 Pittsburg, Penn.... 1 Leavenworth, Kan. 10 Ottawa, Ont 30 Omaha, Neb 15 Cleveland, Ohio... 8 Hurou, D. T 25 Sandusky, Ohio.... (> Bismarck. D. T....27 Mackinaw City 1 Fort Custer, M. T.. 2 Chicago. Ill S MUSICAL m DRAMATIC. Edwin Booth is playing a five weeks' engagement in Boston. Thirty bands were in the lord mayor s recent inaugural procession at Dublin. Mrs. Kate Chase (formerly Mrs. Sprague) is to make an actress of her eldest daughter. Adelina Patti declares that she would xathcr broil a beefsteak than ''bring down the fhouse." Mrs. Thurber, of American Opera company celebrity, is said to have offered ahaiulssome sum for an opera comixwed by an American. An English version of Sardou's latest sucicess, 'Georgette," will be soon produced in ^London with Mrs. Bernard Beere in the leadting part. ? Mme. Henry Greville is now writing !for tho American stage a drama out of her ovel "Cleopatra," a most striking character of Russian life. ^ Manager James W. Collier, of the Mnion Squai'e theatre, New York, has Fbought the manuscript of John McCullough's ^Hjiladiator." for S5.000. whom they thought unlit tor mm. ru* was wise in asking their counsel, but not wise in rejecting it. Captivated with her looks the big son wanted to marry a daughter of one of the hostile families, a deceitful, hypocritical, I whining and saturnine creature, who afterward made for him a world of trouble till she quit him forever. In my text his parents forbade the banns, practically saying: "When there are so many honest | and beautiful maidens of your own country are you so hard put to for a lifetime partner ! I that you propose conjugality with this foreign flirt? Is there such a dearth of lilies in our Israelitish gardens that you must wear on your heart a Philistine thistle? Do you take a crab apple because there are no pomegranates? 'Is there never a woman among the daughters of thy brethern or among all my people that thou goest to tako a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines?'" Excuseless was he for such a choice in a land and amid a race celebrated for female loveliness and moral worth, a land and a race of which self-denying Abigail and heroic Deborah and dazzling Yashti and pious Esther and glorious Ruth and Mary who hugged to her heart the blessed Ix>rd were only magnificent specimens. The midnight folded in their hair, the lakes of liquid beauty in their eve, the gracefulness of spring morning in their posture and gait were ouly typical of the greater brilliance and glory of their soul. Likewise excuseless is any man in our time who makes lifelong alliance with any one who because of her cfis]X)sition or heredity or habits or intellectual vacuity or moral twistification mm- ho ?nir] fti h(? of the Philistines. The" world never owned such opulence of I womanly character, or such splendor of womanly manners of such multitudinous instances of wifely, motherly, daughterly, sisterly devotion as it owns to-day. I have not words to express my admiration for good womanhood. Woman is not only man's equal but in ailectional and emotional nature, wliich is the best part of us, she is seventyfive per cent. his superior. Yea: during the last twenty years, through the increased opportunity opened for female education, tho women of the country are better educated than the majority of men, and if they continue to ad vance* in mentality at the present ratio before long the majority of men will have difficulty in finding iu the opposite sex enough ignorance to make an appropriate consort. If I am under a delusion as to thu abundance of good womanhood abroad conse?uent U{>on my surroundings since the hour entered this life until now, I hope the delusion will last until I embark from this planet. So you will understand if I say in this course of sermons some things that seem severe I am neither cynical nor disgruntled. ??.*i <]ltv><-.c+ m-upv fnrm.liftiup in t.JlP I country, in almost every homo of the great town, conscientious "women, worshipful women, holy women, innumerable Marys sitting at the feet of Christ, innumerable Marthas preparing to feed Christ in the prisou of his suffering discipjes, a thousand capped and spectacled grandmothers' Lois, bending over Bibloj-, whoso precepts they have followed from early girlhood, and tens of thousands of young women that are dawning upon us from school and seminary, that are going to bless the world with good and happy homes that shall eclipse all their predecessors, a fact that will be acknowledged by all men except those who are struck through with moral decay from toe to crauium, and more inexcusable than the Samson of the text Is,that man who amid all this unparalleled munificence of womanhood marries a fool. But some of you are already suffering from such disaster, "and to halt others of you from going over the same precipice I cry out, in the words of my text: "Is there never a woman among me daughters of thy brethren or among afl thy people that thou goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines <" There are thousands of American pulpits, among them this pulpit, guilty in the fact that on some of the suojects on which man and woman need practical advice tney nave been silent or teacning them only in forceless circumlocution. About the choice of a lifetime companion, in which so much of time and all of eternity are involved, what almost universal silence in the church, so that there are not ten people in this house who haveever heard a discourse upon this theme,and the first one I have ever heard is the one I am preaching. "We leave to the flippant novel or the spectacular play or the jiugle of a doggerel rhyme that which ouglu to burden the most tremendous sennon a minister ever preaches from the day when he takes ordination to the day when in judgment he meets his God. And so, in this course of sermons, I am going to hitch up my best team to the whiffletreo and put the coulter of the plow clear up to the beam and go straight on from fence to fence,however many nests of moles and serpents may be ripped up by the furrow, and however many alarmed persons may cry 4iwhoa!" That marriage is the destination of the human race is a mistake that I want to correct before I go further. There are multitudes who never will marry, and still greater multitudes who are not fit to marry. In Great Britain to-day there are 948,000 more women than men. And that, I understand, is about t.ho ratio in America. Bv mathematical and 1 inexorable law, you see, millions of women will never marry. The supply for matrimony is greater than the demand, the first lesson of which is that ever}' woman ought to prepare to take care of herself if need be. Then there are thousands of men who have no right to marry, because they have become so corrupt of character that their offer of marriage is an insult to any good woman. Society will havo to be toned up and corrected on this subject, so that it shall realize that if a woman who has sacrificed her honor is unfitted for marriage, so is any man who has ever sacrificed his purity. What right have you, oh, masculine beast, whose life has been loose, to take under your care the spotlessness of a virgin reared in the sanctity of a respectable home? Will a buzzard dare to court a dove? | But the majority of you will marry, and ! have a ri<jht to marry, and as your religious I teacher i wish to say to these men in the choice of a wife first of all seek divine direc! tion. About thirty-five years ago when Mar! tin Farquar Tupper, the English poet, urged men to prayer beforo they decided upon matrimonial association, people laughed. And some of them have lived to laugh on the other side of their mouth. The need of divine direction I argue from the fact that so many men, and some of them strong and wise, have wrecked their lives at this juncture. Witness Samson and this woman of Timnath. Witness Socrates, pecked of the historical Xantippe. Witness Job, whose wife had nothing to prescribe for t his carbuncles but allopathic doses of profanity. Witness Ananias, a liar who mignt perhaps have been cured by a truthful spouse,, yet marrying as great a liar as himself?Sapphira. Witness John Wesley, one of the best men that ever lived, united to one of the most outrageous and scandalous of J women, who sat iu City Roads chapel making mouths at him while he preached. Witness the once connubial wretchedness of John Ruskin, the great art essayist, and Frederick "VV. Robertson, the great preacher. Witness a thousand hells on earth kindled by unworthy wives, termagants that scold like a March northeaster, female spendthrifts that put their husbands into fraudulent schemes to get money enough to meet the lavishment of domestic expenditure, opium-eating women? about 400.000 of thein in the United States? who will have the drug though it should cause the eternal damnation of the whole household. heartless and overbearing, and nambypamby and unreasonable women, vet married, married perhaps to good men. These are the women who build the low club-houses where the husbands and sons go because they can't stand it at home. On this sea of matrimony where so many have wrecked, am I not right in advising divine pilotage Especially is devout supplication needed because of the fact that society is so full of articificialities that men are deceived to whom they are marrying, and 110 one but the Lord knows. After the dress maker and the milliner and the jeweler and the hairadjuster and the dancing master and the cosmetic art have completed their work, how is an unsophisticated man to decipher the physiological hieroglyphics and make accurate judgment of who it is to whom ho offers hand and heart. That is what makes so manv recreant husbands. They make an honorable marriage contract, but the goods delivered are so different from the samme bv wMch tbey bargained."^ They were simply swindled and tbey backed out. They mistook Jezabel for Longfellow's Evangeline, and Lucretia Borgia for Martha Washington. Aye, as the Indian chief boasts of the Bcalps ne has taken, so there are in society today many coquettes who boast of the masculine hearts they have captured. And these women, though they may live amid richest upholstery, are not so honorable as the Cyprians of the streets, for they advertise their infamy, while the former profess heaven while they mean hell. There is so much counterfeit womanhood abroad it is no wonder that some cannot tell the genuine coin from the base. Do you not realize you need divine guidance when I remind you that mistake is possible in this important affair and. if made, irrevocable ? Tne worst predicament possible is to De unnappuy yoKeci togerner. i ou soe it is impossible to break the yoke. The more you pull apart, the more galling the yoke. The minister might bring you up again and in your presence read the marriage ceremony back ward, might put you on the opposite sides of the altar from^vhere you were when you were united, might take the ring off of the finger, might rend the wedding veil asunder, might tear out the marriage leaf from the family Bible record; but all that would fail to unmarry you. It is better not to make the mistake than to attempt its correction. But men and women do not reveal all their characteristics till after marriage, and how are you to avoid committing the fatal blunder? There is only one Being in the universe who can tell you whom to choose, and that is the Lord of Paradise. He made Eve for Adam and Adam for Eve and both for each other. Adam had not a large group of women from whom to select his wife, but it is fortunate, judging from the mistakes which she afterward made, that it was Eve or nothing. There is in all the world some one who was made for you as certainly as Eve was made for Adain. All sorts of mistakes occur because Eve was made out of a rib from Adam's side. Nobody knows which of his twentyfour ribs was taken for the nucleus. If you depend entirely upon yourself in the selection of a wife there are twenty-three possibilities to one that you will select the wrong rib. By the fate of Ahab, whose wife induced him to | steal; by the fate of Macbeth, whose wife pushed him into massacre; by tho fate of James Ferguson, the philosopher, whose wife 4- ? ? 1 i-1. ^ VV* ? >!?< In V* /> * ?? I eiuereu tut) ruuui mmu uu wilfully upset his astronomical apparatus so that ho turned to the audience and said: uJ>ailies and gentlemen, I have the misfor- ! tune to l>e married to this woman;" by the 1 fate of Bulwer, the novelist, whose wife's temper was so incompatible he furnished her a beautiful house near London aud withdrew from her company, leaving her with the one dozen (logs whom she entertained as pets; by the fate of John Milton, who married a termagant after he was blind, and when some one called her a rose the poet said: "I am no judge of colors,- but it may be so for I feel the thorns daily;" by the fate of an Englishman, whoso wife was so determined to dance on his grave that he was buried in the sea; by the late of a village minister, whom I know, whose wife threw a cup of hot tea across the table because they differed in sentiment?by all these scenes of disquietudo and domestic calamity we implore you. to be cautious aud prayerful and before you enter upon the connubial state which decides whether a man shall have two heavens or two hells, a heaven here and a heaven forever or a hell now and a hell hereafter. By the bliss of Pliny, whose wife when her husband was pleading in court, had messengers coming and. going to inform her what impression he was making; by the joy of Orotius, whose wife I delivered him from prison under the pretense | oQpritvl Anf- Incf rlinv hit inin- ! Ul UUVIU^ UWIKO V.U1 1 ivu vuw AVOW w??vj 4"J? I rious to his health, she sending out her husband unobserved in oue of the book-eases ; by J the good fortune of Roland in Louis1 time, I whose wife translated and composed for her | husband while secretary of the interior?talented, heroic, wonderful Madam Roland; by ! the happiness of many a man who has made intelligent choice of one capable of being prime counselor and companion in brightness and in grief?pray to Almighty God morning, noon and night, that at the right time and in the right way He will send you a good,? honest, loving, sympathetic wife, or if she is ] not sent to you that you may be sent to her. At this point let me warn you not to let a question of this impoiiance bo settled by the celebrated match-makers in almost every community. Depend-upon your own judgment divinely illumined. These brokers in matrimony are ever planning how they can unite impecunious innocence to an heiress or celibate woman to millionaire or marquis, and that in many cases makes life an unhappiness. How can any human being who * knows neither of the two parties as God knows them, and who is ignorant of the future, give such direction as you require at such a crisis. Take the advice of the earthly match-maker instead of the divine guidance, and you may some day be led to use the words of Solomon, whose experience in home life was as melancholy as it was multitudinous. Une day nis paiace witn its great; wiue rooms and great wide doors and great wide hall, was too small for him, ana the loud tongue of a woman belaboring him about some of his neglects, and he retreated to the housetop to get relief from the lingual bombardment. And while there he saw a poor man on one corner of the roof with a mattress for his only furniture and the open sky his only covering. And Solomon envies him and ones out: "It is better to dwell in tbo corner of the housetop than with a brawling woman in a wide house." And one day during the rainy season the water leaked through the roof of the palace and began to drop in a pail or pan set there to catch it; and at one side of him all day long the water went drop I drop 1 drop! while on the other side a female companion quarreling about this and quarreling about that, her acrimonious and petulant words falliner on bis ear in ceaseless pelting?drop! drop! drop! And he seized his pen aud wrote: "A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike." If Solomon had been as prayerful at the beginning of his life as he was at the close, how much domestic infelicity he would have avoided. .mit prayer aooui; mis win amount to nothing unless you pray soon enough. Wait until you are fascinated and the equilibrium of your soul is disturbod by a magnetic and exquisite presence and then you will answer your own prayers and you will mistake your own infatuation for the voice of God. If you have this prayerful spirit you will surely avoid all female scoffers at the Christian religion, and there are quite a number of them in all communities. It must be told that, though the only influence that keeps woman from being estimated and treated as a slave?aye, as a brute and a beast of burden?is Christianity, since where it is not dominant she is so treated, yet there are women who will so forget themselves and forget their God that they will go and hear lecturers malign Christianity and scoff at the most sacred things of the soul. A good woman, over-persuaded by her husband, may go once to hear such a tirade against the Christian religion, not fully knowing what she is going to hear. But she will not go twice. A woman, not a Christian but a respecter of religion, said to me: "I was persuaded by my husband to go and hear an infidel lecturer once, but going homo I said to him: 'My dear husband, I would not go again though my declination should result in our divorcement forever.'" And the woman was right. If after all that Christ and Christianity have done for a woman she can go again and again to hear such assault she is an awful creature, and you had better not come near such a reeking lepress. She needs to bo washed, and for three weeks soaked in carbolic acid, and for a whole year fumigated before she is fit for decent society. While it is not demanded that a woman be a Christian before marriage, she must have regard for the Christiau religion or she is a bad woman,and unworthy of being your companion in a life charged with such stupendous solemnities and vicissitudes. What you want, oh man, in a wife is not a butterfly of the sunshine, not a giggling nonentity, not a painted doll, not a gossiping gad-about, not a mixture of artificialities which leave you in doubt as to where the humbug ends and the woman begins, but an earnest soul, one that cannot only laugh when 3'ou laugh, but weep when you weep. There will bo wide, deep graves in your path of life, and you will both want steadying when you come to the verge of them, I tell you! When your fortune fails you will want some one to talk of treasures in heaven and not charge upon you with a bitter "I told you so." As far as I can analyze it. sincerity and earnestness are the foundation of all worthy wifehood. Get that and you get all. Fail to get that and you get nothing but what you will wish you never had got. Don't make the mistake that man of the text made in letting his eye settle the question in which coolest judgment, directed by Divine wisdom, are all important. He who has no reason for his wifely choice except a pretty face is like a man who should buy a farm l>ecause of the dahlias in the front door-yard. Beauty is a talent and when God gives it He intends it as a benediction upon a woman's face. When the good princess of Wales dismounted from the rail train last summer and I saw her radiant face, I could understand what they told me the day before that when at the great military hospital, where are now the wounded and the sick from the Egyptian and other wars the princess passed through, all the sick were cheered at her coming, and those who could be roused neither by doctor or nurse from their stupor, would get up on their elbow to look at her, and wan lips prayed an audible prayer; "God bless the Princess of WalesI Doesn't sho look beautiful?" But how uncertain is the tarrying of beauty in a human countenance. Explosion of a kerosene lamp turns it into scarification and a scoundrel with one dash of vitriol may dispel it, or Time will drive his chariot wheels across that bright face,cutting it up in deep ruts and irullevs. But there is an eternal beauty on the face of some women whom a rough and ungallant world may criticize as homely, and though their features may contradict all the laws of Lavater on physiognomy, yet they have graces of soul that will keep them attractive for time and glorious through all eternity. There are two or three circumstances in which the plainest wife is a queen of beauty to her husband whatever her stature and profile. By financial panic or betrayal of business partner the man goes down, and returning to his home that evening, he says: "I am ruined; I am in disgrace forever; I care not whether I live or die." It is an agitated story ho is telling in the household that winter night. He says: "The furniture must go; the house must go: th9 social position must go, and from being sought for obseauiously as once, we must be cold-shouldered everywhere.11 After he ceases talking and the wife has heard all in silence,she says: "Is that all? Why, you had nothing when I married you, and you have only come back to where you started. If you think that my happiness and that of the children depends on these trappings you do not know me, though we have lived' together'thirty years. God is not dead and the national bank of heaven has not | suspended payment, and if you don't mind I don't care a cent. "What 'little wo need of l'ood and raiment the rest of our lives we can get, and I don't propose to sit down and mope and groan. Mary, hand me that darning needle; and John, light one of the other gas burners; and, Jimmy, open the register for a little more heat. Fanny, fetch your father's slippers. I declare! I nave rorgotten to set tne rising ior tnose I cakesi" And while she is busy at it he hears I her humming Newton's old hymn about tomorrow: " It can bring with it nothing But He will bear us through; Who gives the lilies clothing Will clothe his people too; Beneath the spreading heavens No creature but is fed; And He who feeds the ravens Will give his children bread. u Though vine nor fig-tree either Their wonted fruit should bear, Though all the fields should wither Nor flocks nor herds be there; Yet God the same abiding, His praise shall tune my voice; Vor while in him confiding .1 cannot but rejoice." The husband looks up in amazement and says: "Well, well, you are the greatest woman I ever saw, I thought you would faint cbad away when I told you." And as he j l ioksat her all the glories of physiognomy in the court of Louis XV. or in the modern fashion plates are tame as compared with the I superhuman splendor of that woman's face. Joan of Arc, and Marie Antoinette and La Belle Hamilton, the enchantment of I the court ot unaries 11. are nownere. There is another time when the plainest wife is a queen of beauty to her husband. She has done tne work of life. She has reared her children for God and heaven, and though sonic of them may be a little wild they will yet come back, for God lias promised. She is dying and her husband stands by. They think over all the years of their companionship, the weddings and the burials, tne ups ana downs, the successes and the failures. They talk over the goodness of God and his faith. fulness to children and children's children. She has no fear about going. The Lord has sustained her so many years she would not daro to distrust him now. The lips of both of them tremble as they say good-bye and eucourago each other about an early meeting in a better world. The breath is feebler and feebler and stops. Are you sure of it? Just hold that mirror at the mouth and see if there is any vapor gathering on the surface. Gonel As one of the neighbors takes the old man by the arm gently and says: "Come, you had | better go into the next room and rest. He says: ''Wait a moment! I must take one more look atthat face and at those hands." Beau nrui! -Beauuiuu My friends, I hope you do not call that death. That is an autumnal sunset. That is a crystalline river pouring into a crystal sea. That is the solo of human life overpowered by hallelujah chorus. That is is a queen'3 coronation. That is heaven. That is the way my father stood at eighty-two, seeing my mother depart at sevonty-nine. Perhaps so your father and mother went.' I wonder if we will die as well J TEMPERANCE DEPARTMENT. "Compensation." 1' Compensation! compensation!" Is the liquor-dealers' cry, As they see the people's freedoip And their bondage drawing nigh; "Give, oh! give us compensation For the losses we may meet; Let us have remuneration For past gains?to us so sweet." Let them first make restitution Of the plunder that they gain From the mothers, wives, and children, Of the men their trade lias slain; Let them give remuneration For the lives by it destroyed, Then we'll talk of compensation; Until their claim is void. Let them show the "compensation" Which they give to those they wrong? To the poor, by drink made poorer; To the weak, who once were strong. Who will pay the wretched outcast For the ruin drink has wrought? Who will pay the drink-cursed children mat Dy sm are soia ana Dougnt! Who will "compensate" the mother For her boy by drink laid low? What will pay her for the anguish She has suffered from that dIow? Who will pay for sullied honor, Blasted hopes, and rained life; For a future full of terror, For a past with horrors rife? "Woe to him," says God in anger. "Who shall give his neighbor drink; Who shall tempt the weak to ruin, And his soul to hell shall sink!" God is just; His truth eternal; And He careth for His own. Law of man that dares dishonor Word of God shall be o'erthrown. God is just; just compensation At His hand they will receive; And His judgments stand for ever? From His sentence no reprieve! Let us leave to Him the measure Of their guilt and its reward, While we work to crush the traffic That drives souls from Him, their Lord. ?National Tempcrance Advocate. A Truth That is Apparent. "Fully eight-tenths of the crime com- 1 mittcd in this country," says Judge Noah ; Davis, of New York, "may be attributed : to the use of strong drink." This truth is so apparent that we might add it does j not require a judicial mind to so inform i the public, although it lends a very em- | pliatic endorsement to what this journal j has always and will always maintain. Re- ! move the iniquitous system of selling in- i toxicating beverages, and you purify the moral status of every community. Every advocate of reform should recognize the necessity of protesting against the liquor traffic before they can ever hope to better the world.?West Grove (Pcnn.) Independent. U Among the regulations of a ncwlj formed church among the Zulus in South Africa is the following: No member of this church shall be permitted to drink the white man's grog, or nativ< beer, nor touch it with his lips. I . A His One Fault. No one can estimate the results which may flow from habitually throwing the weight of his own influence on the side of the truth. A traveler on the French Broad came one dav, in his search foi ' i a horse or mule to take him further on his journey, upon a dilapidated house, where lived a man celebrated in the region foi his bad habits. He was then just recovering from a debauch. After some conversation, the host informed his visitor that he was sure he mu3t be a Yankee. "Well, my friend," said the other, "I am a Yankee, and whatever you are, you're a very decent fellow. You've only one fault, and if you won't shoot me, I'll tell you what it is." "I won't. What is it?" lie asked, smil? ingly. "And you won't draw that butcherknife you carry in the back pocket of your trousers?" "I don't carry one, so I won't draw it," he answered, now laughing outright. "It's that flask of applejack in your side pocket. Throw it away, and there isn't anything you couldn't make of yourself." "Do you believe that?*' "I don't believe it; I know it." "Then I'll throw it away." . "Do it at once. Pitch it out of the window, and never taste the stuff again." He took the flask from his pockct, and gazed fixedly at it for a moment. Then he said: "But how can I do it, stranger? "What other comfort has a man, that has had such losses and disappointments as I've | had? It's only when I take it that I feel like a man." 4'It's only a false manhood." The man rose and paced the floor with an uncertain step, finally pausing to say, ''Are you a preacher?" "No, I am not, but I can't bear to see a fine, manly fellow like you going straight to ruin, without saying a word to stop him." "With a long swing of his arm, the man threw the flask out of an opening in the wall, saying, when he had done so, ' 'Sir, I don't know your name, and I may never see you again, but I solemnly prom* isc you never to taste a drop of the stuff from this time forth forever." He kept his word, as the traveler months afterward ascertained. As he also learned, the reformed man had ofte:i before come to the brink of making the same resolution, but on this particular day it needed but a feather of remonstrance to turn the J scalc. The Cost of Drinks. Temperance advocates tell us that if everybody would stop drinking beer and and whisky, business would immediately revive. That sounds like an overdrawn statement, but it has often been shown that those who drink pay more money into the coffers of the saloons than the -whole country pays in taxes. If it were not so evident that the appetite clouds the reason it would appear amazing that men, who will haggle over a few cents in the price of a pair of boots, which are sold at a very small profit, or will buy adulterated coffee because it is a little cheaper than the genuine, will pay immense profits on the beer or whisky they drink without a thought of the way in which they are imposed upon. The following statistics are quoted to illustrate this drain upon the drinkers: A glass 01 Deer costs nve cents, mere are 640 glasses in a barrel, so'that the retailer receives $32 for every barrel of beer he draws. The profit is something like 400 per cent. At least i5,000,000 barrels of beer were consumed in this country last year, for which the drinkers paid the aggregate of $480,000,090. Whiskey and other strong drinks average seven cents a glass, or $4.48 a gallon at retail. About 78,000,000 gallons were imbibed in this country last year, the drinkers paying therefor nearly $350,000,000. Imagine the hulla- j balloo that would be raised if the retailers of groceries and provisions charged such tremendous profits on their goods. Now, supposing this $800,000,000 spent yearly for drinks that do no good were saved or spent for articles of use and*real comfort. That vast sum would buy a good suit oi cioines ior every man in mc land, give every woman a decent dress and bonnet, and clothe and shoe every child. The economic use of $800,000,000, put where it would do the most good instead of. where it does the most evil, are incalculable, and those who tell us that business would at once revive if everybody stopped drinking do not appear to be very far out of the way after all.?Springfield Union. Temperance Notes. A hint for the day: Boycott the bottle. A Iloosac Falls (Mass.) employer of 1,500 men, has posted a notice that any oue of his workmen icen entering a drinking saloon will be discharged. In the report, in one of the New York dailies, of a notable social event?the giving of a reception by the Sorosis, in honor of Mary Anderson, recently?the n'rtnifi/totif fnnf lo nrtfrtrl fliot tlin m.inii I Di^iuuv aiib 1UV/V LUHU uiav> iiiuiiu differed from similar affairs for men only in "the entire absence of wine from the table." ' In England there are more than fourteen hundred parishes where the traffic i.s j forbidden, and where it does not exist: j it has been for many years expelled from j two large districts in London, tw large j sections of Liverpool, one large district each in Birmingham and Manchester. It j was entirely driven out from the great manufacturing town Salt aire, in Yorkshire, more than thirty years ago, and , from the large manufacturing town Bess- j brook, in Ireland, and from a district of | county Tyrone, containing sixty-two square miles, n>ore tfian thirty years ago. f Hope Thou la God. despair not, though thy life is dim, God cares for thee; hope thou in Him And do not fear to haste along "With trustful song, For blessings shall around thee throng. Why all things change seek not to know, God makes the spring-time come and go; And no one guides thy life but He, Oh, quiet be, Until His reasons thou dost see. The shifting shadows of the day Are sometimes dark on each one's way And thine own path that seems in night Leads on to light. So forward, strong for God and right. Do troubles gather round thy head? Steep is the path thou hast to tread? Hope still in God, yield not to fears, But through thy tears, Read the good story of the years. God cared for thee a little child, He led thee when the way was wild, He gave thee joy with every day, Oh, hope and pray, He shall light up the homeward way. He who has been thy helper yet Will not forsake, will not forget; He blesses, and thou shalt be blest; Oh, tired heart rest, Be sure He only sends the best ?Marianne Farningham. RELIGIOUS READING. His Workmanship. Theodore Monod once made nse of this beautiful illustration. He said: "If a piece 1 of iron could speak, what would it say? It would say, 'I am black, I am cold, I am ' hard.' Perfectly true. But put that I piece of iron into the furnace and wait j awhile, and what would it say? 'The ' blackness is gone, and the coldness is gone, and the hardness is gone'?it has passed into a new cxpenncc. jtsur n that piece of iron could speak, surely it would not glory in itself, because the fire and iron are now two distinct things that remain distinct to the last. If it could glory it would glory in the fire and not in itself?in the fire that kept it a bright molten mass. So in myself I am black, I am cold, and I am hard, but if the Lord takes possession of my soul, if I am filled with Love, if his Spirit fills my being, the blackness will go, and the coldness will go, and the hardness will go; and yet the glory does not belong to me, but to the Lord, who keeps me in a sense of his love," The Prayer Meeting. Wp wrifp nr*nn nn old theme, but we .. ~ / have the testimony of a personal experience to bear which may be of service. Our circumstances were such that for a number of months we were debarred from attending the weekly meeting in the place of our residence. Now again it has been our privilege to unite week by week with God's people in prayer and conference. Our testimony bears first upon the matter of habit. It is easy to form the habit of non-attendance. It is easy, when one is so disposed, to find excuses for remaining away. There is no end to the convenient reasons that may be found if we have a mind to allow passing inclination to determine our conduct in thisregard. Our experience teaches us that we must make our attendance upon the prayer-meeting a matter of duty. It must not be at the mercy of passing inclination. For although our general desire is to be with God's people in the place where prayer is wont to be made, yet there may be backward eddies in the current, and so the inclination of the moment might keep us away when the strong sense of duty would hold us to our course. "When we make it a duty to attend the prayer-meeting we soon find that it is a privilege. Our testimony bears, secondly, upon the value of the prayer-meeting. Our attendance had been intermitted long enough for us to feel afresh its value when the privilege was restored. And now we welcome the sweet hour of prayer. We are burdened with many cares; cur life is a busy one. But the time we spend in the place of prayer is not time lost even from our work. We are rested and refreshed while we turn aside from our usual occupations, for the hour of social worship. Our soul is refreshed. We get a new view of divine truth. We catch the echo of some precious promise. The love of God is shed abroad in the heart. We have an opportunity to testify of God's love. We can join our petitions to those of others, praying, "Come, Holy Spirit, come!" The prayer-meeting so, becomes, as it were, a little section of heaven let down into the midst of the toil and care of the daily life. The hour comes to a close, and we go away refreshed, more ready for the work we are called upon to do. "We have left out of view here, as will have been perceived, any consideration of the prayer-meeting as a place of Christian work. We have looked at it simply in its bearing upon the Christian's own character and religious comfort. This other view of it might be dwelt upon, but we do not take it up now. But we wish to bear our distinct and emphatic testimony to the great value of the prayer-meeting in securing Christian comfort, and maintaining Christian progress. The disciple of Christ, providential hindrances apart, cannot afford to miss the stated meeting for prayer and conference. He is robbing himself when he neglects it.?American Messenger. The study of the drink question iu Switzerland has disclosed the fact that the use of alcoholic beverages is largest in tlioso cantons in which wages are lowest, and the people are the poorest. The adults of the village of Ste.Marthe, Canada, with a population of 2,000, on a recent Sunday pledged themselves to abstain from intoxicating drinka for t year. MAKING SONGS. | THE ORIGIN OF SOME VHU?. KNOWN COMPOSITIONS. ' fflsa The Little Back Parlor in Pittsburg Prom Which Game Forth Man^ Beautiful Melodies?A Storj . of Three Friends. Who has not been awakened from his sleep in the early morning hours by some party of home-going revelers singing, 4;Way down upon the Suwanee River?'* The melodious music invades the halfroused senses like a dream, and the dreamer does not resist it. He closes his eyes again to listen?motionless. He has neara me oia song many umes ueiurc uc can anticipate every word and note; there is no novelty in it for him, but he is not provoked at being awakened. He listens dreamily and lets the music bring to him q thoughts of home?not the home of his manhood, made happy by wife and children, but the dream home of his childhood, where mother was. There stood in the city of Pittsburg, forty years ago, a cottage at 31 Pearl M street. It was a cozy home, with vinecovered windows and a broad hearthstone. It was the home of Charles P. Shiras and his mother, familiarly known to her friends as "Aunt Becky" Shiras. Charles Shiras had two particular friends of his own age, Stepen Foster and John Hull. These men had been companions from their boyhood, and death alone broke off their friendship. Shiras was a literary genius. He was well educated, brilliant, and possessed of a fertile, active mind. He was ambitious and animated by the noblest purposes. For some years, and at the time of his death, he was connected with the Pittsburg Commercial Journal. All his literary work was full of merit and many of his productions gained wide attention. He published two small volumes of poems, the best known of which are "Dollars and Dimes,''Redemption of Labor," and "The Iron City." These he considered his best work, but he strangely refused to publicly acknowledge the authorship of the beoutiful songs which would have given his name, with that of Foster, world-wide fame. He erred in his judg- \ ment of the effect they would produce, /?? and in his ambition for higher flights, considered them childish and foolish. Foster was a musician and composer. His soul was full of the poetry of sound. He had a fine, effeminate face, and his nature was as soft and yielding as a ; maiden's. He was a dreamer, often sad and melancholy, and every bar of his beautiful, simple music is marked with the characteristics of his nature. He found close sympathy in the fine, poetic mind of Shiras, and both found sympathy and encouragement in the more rugged and aggressive nature of their mutual friend. Hull. Hull was a mechanic, working for his daily bread from his earliest boyhood. Unlike his friends, he had no education, but tlie circumstances of his life gave him strong good sense and clear judgment. He was a lover of the beautiful, and he found much to admire in his friends Shiras and Foster. He had a musical voice, and Foster, who could not sing, tiught him music. He had a retentive memory, and from Shiras he learned much of literature. He became the critic of the productions of both his friends, and his judgment of a poem or a song was to them all-sufficient. And so a beautiful friendship existed between these three in boyhood, in youth and until their early manhood, when Shiras died. They were together during all their leisure time, and umany happy hours they squandered" in "Aunt Becky" Shiras' little back parlor. It was here /:? that Shiras, in his resting moments, wrote fVif?co lioniitifni snnffs to r>lease his friend uwjv wvuv?v??. -?-- r . "t&ma Foster; it was here that Foster composed music for them to. please himself and hit friend Hull, and it was here that Hull sang them for the pleasure of all. The first song they published was "Old | Uncle Ned." Foster sold it to a Pittsburg house for $100. "With this money he purchased a small piano and placed it in "Aunt Becky" Shiras' little parlor. And on this little piano he afterward played music which has gono around the w.orld. "Old Uncle Ned" made its appearance about tha Jj year 1830, and immediately became popular. "Within three years later Shiras and Foster together produced ' 'Old Folks at Home." "Susannah, Don't You Cry," "Gentle Annie," "Hard Times Com* Again No More," "My Old Kentucky Home," "Massa's in dc Cold, Cold, Ground," "Old Dog Tray," "Willie, W? Have Missed You," "Come "Where My Love Lies Dreamiug," and others fully a* popular. It is certain that Shiras wrote the lines of nearly all these songs, except . ^ 4'Come "Where My Love Lies Dreaming."" Foster was willing and anxious to shar# their authorship with his friend Shiras. but the latter often laughingly told Foster that he was welcome to all the reputation he would get from their publication. Poor Shiras died when he was twentynine years old, before he dreamed that the songs which he had written in an idle fancy, as a mere pastime, would live in every home in the Christian world. Mrs. Jane Swisshelm wrote his obituary. He left a young wife and a girl baby. This baby is now a buxom mother of babies. Foster lived some years after the death of his friend. He went to New York city, where he died in 1864, from the effects of a fall in the Bowery. He was widely known and very popular. His funeral was attended largely by the literary, theatrical and musical classes. A cnorus oi vuitcs utU , ''Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming." ? Chicago Neics. How Long Have We to Lire? The following is one of the well-au- . thenticated tables in use among London assurance companies, showing the average length of life at various ages. In the first column we have the present ages of persons of average health, and in the second column we are enabled to look, as it were, behind the scenes of an assurance officer, and gather from their table the number of years they will give us to live. This table has been the result of careful calculation, and seldom proves misleading. Of rmirse sudden and premature deaths, us well as lives unusually extended, occasionally occur, but this is a table of the average expectancy of life of an ordinary man or woman. Age. More years to Live. 1 39 10 51 41 ;;o :J4 40 28 50 21 f?0 14 70 'J SO 4 Boston constructed more buildings during 1-885 than in any year since that following the great fire. The total value of these was $8,000,000.