Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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A Family Companion, Devoted to Literature, Miscellany, News, Agriculture, Markets, &c. Vol. XIl WEDNESDAY MORNING, JANUARY 5, 1876. NO.1. IS PUBLISHED 'RY WED-NESDAY MORNIN G, At Newberry, So C .T.H09, Fe GRENEKER Editor and Proprietor. ms, $2.50 per e1nznunt., *Invariably in Advance. The Paper is stopped at the expiration Of 'o 0?Whh it is paid. The >4mark denotes expiration of sub ;1on. WEIGHING THE BABY. How many pounds does .the baby weigh? Baby who came but a month ago; How many poands from the growing curl To the rosy point of the testless toe? Grand-father ties the kerchief knot., Tenderly gaides the -swinging weig4t; And carefully oier his glasses peerst To read the record-'only'eight." Softly the echo goes around. The father laughs at the tiny girl; The fair young mother sings the words, While grand-mother smooths the golden curl. 'And stooping above the precious thing,* XemIes a kiss within a prayer, Mu-muring softly, "Llitte one, Graud-father did not weigh you fair." Nobody weighed the baby's smiles, Or the love that came with the helples one; Nobody weighed the threds of car, From which a woman's life is spun.. No index tells the mighty worth Of, 'a little baby's-quiet breath, -A s6ft, unceasing metronome, Patient and faithful unto death. Nobody w.igShed the baby's soal, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit to the skies, while he (not proud al though his collar nearly choked him) blew the 6 e, until the slow potatoes, bubbling up knocked loudly at the saucepan lid to be let ou~ ~zizi peeled. "Wed a-deal of work to finish up last night," replied the girl, "andhad to clear away this morning, mother !" "Well! Never mind, so long as you are come," said Mrs. Cratchit. "Sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm, Lord bless ye." "No, no! There's father coming," cri6d the two young Cratchits, who are. everywhere at once. "Hide, Martha, hide." SoMarthahid herself,and in came little Bob, the father, with at least three feet of comforter, exclusive of the fringe hanging down before him; and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed to look seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon. his shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a lit tle crutch, and had his limbs sup ported by an iron frame. "Why, where's our Martha ?" cried Bob Cratchit, looking around. "Not coming ?" said Mrs. Cratch it. "Not coming!" said Bob, with a sudden declension in his spirits; for he had been Tim's horse all the way from church, and had come home rampant. "Not coming upon Christmas day ?" Martha did not like to see him disappointed, if it were only in a joke; so she came out prematurely from behind the closet door, and ran into his arms, while the two young Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim and bore him off into the wash house, that he might hear the pud ding singing in the copper! "And how did Tim behave?" asked Mrs. Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content. "As. good as gold," said Bob, ndbetter.-S-imcluNi ~1g6 thoughtful sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told, coaing home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, be cause he was a cripple and it might be pleasant to them to remember, upon Christmas day, who made lame beggars walk and blind men see." Bob's voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty. His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back came Tiny Tim before another wo: d was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister to his stool beside the fire. Master Peter and the two ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the goose,with which they soon returned in possession. Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought the goose the rarest of all birds ; a feathered phe nomenon to which a black swan was a matter of course ; and, in truth, it was something very like it in that house. Mrs. Cratchit made the gravy (ready biforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot ; Master Pe ter mashed the potatoes with in credible vigor; Miss Belinda swEet ened up the apple sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates ; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny cor ner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for everybody, not forgetting themselves, and, mounting guard upon their po'ts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shrink the goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said.: It was succeeded by a breatbless pause, as Mrs. Cratchit, looking all slowly along the carving-knife, p r ep ar ed to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long-expected gush of stu.ffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all around the board, and even Tiny Tim, ex cited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried: "Hur rah!" There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn't believe there ever was such a goose- cooked. Its tenderness and flavor, size and cheapness, were the themes of uni versal admiration. Eked out by the apple sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a finished dinner for the whole family; indeed,as Mrs. Cratch it said, with great delight (survey ing one small atom of a bone on the dish,) they hadn't,.ate it all at last ! youngest Cratchits in particular were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows. But now, the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs Cratchit left the room alone -too nervous to bear witnesses---to take the pudding up and bring it in. Suppose it should not be done enough! Suppose it should break in turning over! Suppose some body had got over the wall of the back yard, and stolen it while- they were merry with the goose; a sup position at which the two young Dratchits become livid! All sorts of horrors were supposed. Hallo! A great deal of steam! The pudding was out of the cop per. A smell like a washing day! That was the cloth. A smell like in eating house and a pastry cook's aext door to each other, and a laun Iress next door to that ! That 6 a s the pudding. In h al f a minute, Mrs. Cratchit entered ; fushed but smiling proudly; with bhe pudding, like a speckled can aon ball, so hard and firm, with Christmas holly stuck on the top. Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Oratchit said, and calmly too, that e regarded it the greatest success ,chieved by Mrs. Cratchit since bheir marriage. M r s .. Cratchit said that now the weight was off er mind, she would confess that 5he had had her doubts about the rantity of the four. Everybody had omething to say about it, but no ody said or thought it was at all I small pudding for so large a fam ly. It would have been fl a t eresy to do so. Any . Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such i thing. At last dinner was all done and bhe cloth being cleared, the hearth 1, p a LURre~na p applei md oranges were put upon the ta Dle and a shovelful of chestnuts on he fire. Then all the Cratchit fam ly drew around the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, mean ng a half one. Then Bob propos d: "A merry Christmas to us all, ny dears. God bless us !" Which all the family re-echoed. "God bless us every one !" said Tiny Tim the last of all. He sat very close- to his father's side, upon his litlle stool. Bob hld his withered hand in his, as if e loved the child and wished to keep him by his side and dreaded hat he might be taken from him. "Spirit," said Scrooge, with an nterest he had never felt before, 'tell me if Tiny Tim will live." "I see a vacant seat," replied he Ghost, "in the -poor chimney orner, and a crutch without an own er, carefully preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the uture, the child will die." "No, no," said Scrooge. "Oh no, kind spirit!i say he will be spared." "If these shadows remain unal hred by the future, none other of miy race," returned the Ghost, "will find -him here. What then if he be like to die, he had better do it and decrease the surplus pop aJation." Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the spirit and was overcome with penitence and grief. . "Man," said the Ghost, "if man you be in heart, not adamant, for bear that wicked cant until you have discovered what the surplus is, and where it is. Will you de cide what men shall live, what men shall die ? It may be that in the sight of Heaven you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like thi s poor man's child. Oh G3od! to hear the insect on the leaf pronouncing on the to much life among his hungry brothers in the dust !" Scrooge bent before the Ghost's rebuke, and trembling cast his eyes upon the ground. But he raised them speedily on hearing his own name. "Mr. Scrooge !" said Bob; "I'll give you, Mr. Scrooge, the founder of the feast !" "The founder of the feast, in deed!I" cried Mrs. Cratchit redden ing. "I wish I had him here. I'd give himna piece of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he'd have a good appetite for it." "My dear," said Bob, "the chil drn; Christmas day." I "It should be Christmas day L am sure," said she, "on which one drinks the health of such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man as Mr. Scrooge. You know he is, R&bert! Nobody knows it better than you do, poor fellow !" "My dear," was Bob's mild an swer, "Christmas day." "I'll drink his health for your sake, and the day's," said Mrs Crat chit, "not fori his. Long life to him! A merry Christmas and a happy New Year !-he'll be very merry and very happy, I have no doubt !" The children drank the toast af ter her. It was the first of their proceedings which had no heartiness in it. Tiny Tim drank it last of all, but he didn't care two-pence for it. Scrooge was the ogre of the family. The mention of his name cast a cark shadow on the party which was not dispelled for full five min ates. After it had passed away, they were ten times merrier than before, form the mere relief of Scrooge the baleful being done with. Bob Cratchit told them How he had a situation in his eye for Master Pe ter, which would bring in, if ob taned, fall five-and-six-pence week ly. The two y o u n g Cratchits laughed tremendously at the idea of Peter's being a man of business; and Peter himself looked thought fully at the fire from between his ollars, as if he were deliberating what peculiar investments he should favor when he came into the receipt of that bewildering income. Mar tha, who was a poor apprentice at % milliner's, then told them what kind of work she had to do, and how many hours she worked at a stretch, and now she menat to lie b ed to-morrow morninzom od long rest; to-morrow being a holi cay, she passed at home. Also ow she had seen a countess and a lord some days before, and how the lord was much about as tall as. Pe ter ; at which Peter pulled up his collar so high that you could not have seen his head if you had been there. At this time the chestnuts went round and round, and by-and by they had a song, about a lost child traveling in the snow, from Try Tim, who had a plaintive lit tle voice and sang it'very well in deed. There was nothing of high mark in this. They were not a handsome family; they were not well dressed; their shoes were far from being wa ter proof ; their clothes were scanty ; and Peter might have known, and very likely did, the inside of a pawnbrokers. But they were hap py, grateful, pleased with one an other and con tented with the time; and when they faded, and looked happier yet in the bright sparklings of the spirit's torch at parting Scrooge had his eye upon them, and especially Tiny Tim, until the last. T WEED'S FAIT HFUL WuIFE.--They were married when the man was a chairmaker, and they might have had a happy career had the former remained honest. They lived plainly, mingled with me canics' society, and were the pa rents of two boys and two girls, good looking and healthy children. The era of their unmeritorious splendor has come and gone like a dream. Each had a diamond wedding, and each have sunk into obsrity and poverty. The two sons once held fine appointments in the service of' the Ring, but are now only lounging around the city hall. The mother is in a wid ow's desolation. The ill-gotten wealth is almost allgone. A million and a half has passed into the hands of her lawyers, and her husband is* still a prisoner. A seedy and corpulent old man, in habit-ng a pair of rooms in Lud low street jail is all that is left of one who has been alderman, con gressman, chairmaker and lawyer, commissioner of parks, public buildings and docks, state senator, and for seven years autocrat of this city. The only redeeming eature is the faithful wife, who is reducing herself to poverty in hope of obtaining her husband's release.-New York Letter. What two letters of the alpha bet indicate very cold weather? T C (ir-.) OBITUARIES IN ENGLAND. The following amusing sketch from London Fun shows that the obituary style of literature, though exotic in England, flourishes very well there: I, Mr. Dapper Voluble, salesman, with Messrs. Boltwhack &Tearsheet, linen-drapers, had gone down to Stuckup-super-Mare for a lungful of ozone, and had met many friends. My condition may be inferred-I was overcome by excess of *ozone. Endeavoring to catch my hotel I ran into a churchyard, intending to pass through and intercept the hos telry on the other side-head it off. Unfortunately I struck my foot against a tombstone-there were many stones-a numberless multi tude of stones was in that church yard-companies, squadrons, and battalions, performing their sum mer maneuvers. They appeared to be trying to surround me as, lying flat on my back, I watched their little games. Sometimes they would circle about me so closely that I could almost decipher the in scriptions, and one portentous fel low, I could swear, came and stood at my head, displaying my own name and age in insulting capi tals ; but when I turned to get a better look at the date of my death he was off. All this time the earth was heav ing and swaying unsteadily beneath me, and pretty soon it had so tilted that lookng down the declivity, I saw the beach at an immeasurable distance b e 1o w, thronged with bathers, while the surface of the _____ _ -thickly with pleasure boats. I tried to speculate on the probable number of drown ings that would occur before night fall, but the declivity between me and the beech grew so alarmingly steep that I fainted from fright. When my-senses returned it was late in the- afternoon. The earth resumed its level, the tombstones had ceased their evolutions. Some body was stirring me with his foot -a wild looking young man with an uuholy light in the eyes of him. "Illustrious visitor," he .said, as in response to a more than com monly vigorous kick I rose to my feet, "fear not ; I am a mortal like yourself. I am the Parish Epi taphist. Would you behold my workI' I would behold his work. Taking me familiarly by the hand, he led me to the nearest tombstone. I bent and read : "Here lies the body of Jonathan Scout, Who went in the water and never came out. Supposed to be floating about." "But," said I, "this is a bull! How can this body lie if it is float ing about ?" My companion regarded me for a moment with a compassionate eye then led me silently to another stone: "Beneath this stone repose one Who, when his ta.sk of life was done, We buried by the,salt, salt sea, Which thoroughly had pickled he." "This," I flamed out, is atrocious! -this is intolerable ! 'Pickled he,' indeed ! I will trust myself no longer with a man to whom gram mar is a tradition and a myth !" He would not release my hand, and I followed him unwillingly to the next stone: The l ady who lies here asleep. Was drowned in the briny deep; She went a bathing when the damp Produced in her a sort of cramp." "By Jove !" I thundered, strug gling vainly to release my hand, this is mere murder. Take my purse, my watch ! Take anything I have, but let me go, I tell you! Ha! take this locket, containing a likeness of my wife's au.nt!" He took me ! The next one ran thus: "Little Billy Kemper, Boating in a gale; Midland County Member ' Managing the sail. Midland County Member Didn't look alive, 2d of September, 1865." I struggled no longer; my heart was broken in my breast, and the fead had his will of me.. The fol lowing "tributes of affection" are all that I can noQw recall: "Good Mr. Bloomer-seeds and flowers, Penge Took to the water out of sheer revenge, Because he'd quarreled with the missus. Stark Naked he dived into the hungry-sb ark! They caught that creature at the turn of tide, And laid him here with Mr. B. inside." "How sad alas! to think that Mrs. Nancy Was lighter in feet than she did fancy! Down plumped her head, and in the wave she sprangled. Her winding sheet was linen, nicely man gled." "Poor Jack (stretched here his corpus is) Went out in Harry's Smack: And Jack he fished for porpoises Then Harry fished for Jack!" I could endure no more. "De mon!" I shrieked, extricating my hand from his by a dexterous turn of the wrist; "do you think these these things !- these -preposte rous parodies !-these ghastly in sults to the dead !-are funny? Do you fancy it wit to thus outrage the most sacred sentiment of the hu man heart? Take that, you thief, take that !" And I struck him a tre mendous blow on the top of his head. A moment later I was sitting up in that churchyard, broad awake and rubbing my knuckles, which in my sleep I had abraided against a tombstone. It was pitch dark and I was dank with dew. Thus I knew I had been dreammg. .It was all the fault of the ozone-really! "THAT'S Ml."-I was sitting down in the Orphanage grounds upon one of the seats, talking with one of our brother trustees, when a little fellow, I should think about, eight years of age, left the other boys who played around us and came deliberately up to us. He opened fire on us thus: Please, Mr. Spurgeon, I want to come and sit down on that seat between you two gentlemen." "Come along, Bob,and tell us what you want." "Please, Mr. Spurgeon, suppose here was a little boy who had o father who lived in an orphan ge with a lot of other little boys who had no fathers, and .suppose hose boys had mothers and aunts, who corned once a month, and rought them apples and oranges, and gave them pennies, and sup ose this little boy had no mother, and nobody ever corned to bring im nice things, don't you think somebody ought to give him a penny ? 'Cause, Mr. Spurgeon, that's me." "Somebody felt something wet in his eye, and Bob got a sixpence, ad went off in a state of delight. Poor little soul; he had seized the opportunity to pour out a sor row which made him miserable when the motherly visiting day ame around and as he said, "No body never corned to bring him nice things." Which would you do-smile and make others happy, or be crabbed and make everybody around you miserable ? You can live as it were among beautiful flowers and singing birds, or in the mire'sur rounded by frogs and loathsome reptiles. The amount of happi ness you can produce is incalcula ble, if you can show a amiling face and a kind heart and speak kind words. On the other hand, by your looks, cross words and fretful disposition, you can make a number of persons wretched beyond endurance. Which will you do ? Wear a pleasant counte nance, let joy beam in yonr eyes, and love glow in your face. There are few joys so great- as that which springs from a kind act or a pleasant deed, and yon may feel it~ at night when you rest, in morning when you rise, and through the day when at your daily business. Two old crows which perch on a tree in Dudley, Mass., every afternoon, and caw until hundreds of others are collected, are called Moody and Sankey. A Milwaukie editor has had re turned to him a book borrowed twenty-seven years ago, and be gins to have hopes of humanity ?fter all. .A new name for tight boots-a arn crib. THE PALACE OF ALADDIN. HOW A MONEYED MAN MAKES HIM SELF COMFORTABLE. One of the most enjoyable days I have spent in England was a vis it to Mentmore, Buckinghamshire, the seat of the late Baron Roths child, and still the home of_his widow. I had known all my life of the almost fabulous wealth of the Rothschilds, but had no such vivid conception of the real ity as I brought away with me. The estate comprises 15,000 or 20,000 acres of the finest land of this famous shire. The approach from Cheddington station, from which it is distant about two miles lies through a magnificent lawn leading to a wooden acclivity; up on the summit of which the man sion stands. From the tower the view- is one of the finest in the Midland counties, embracing on one side the ancient manor and v i ll a g e of Wing, on another the manor of Tring, and on 'a third the historic site of Ivanhoe. How the course of the world's his tory has been changed by the blow which an ancestor of John Hamp den struck the Black Prince, the victor of Crecy and Poictiers, for which "Tring, Wing, and Ivan hoe" were forfeited! In the dis tance is the value of Aylesbury, and far away on the right of the Chiltern hills the monument of the Duke of Bridgewater bounds the range of vision. Tring Park, owned by another of the Rothschild family; is said to be second in the beauty of its gar den only to Mentmore; but this I had no time to see. Subtropical gardens, vegetable gardens, the Fountain garden, and the Italian garden occupied us for hours. The first is second, I suppose, on ly to the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew; the second embraces, with the fruit gardens about t% en ty acres, the whole proceeds of which are consumed in the man sion. In one of the numerous grape ries, arranged so as to furnish fruit every monjh in the year, I saw a single cluster of grapes whieh would weigh six pounds, the ber ries on which were about the size of good, large plums and the most luscious I ever tasted. Or anges, figs, pineapples, bananas, and.other tropical fruits consumed in the mansion, are all grown in the conservatories of Mentmore. When the Baroness is absent yatching in the Channel or at her London house, orders .by telegraph are sent t o Ment more daily for the supplies requir ed. The vases in the Fountain and Italian Gardens cost each ?1,000. The statuary is all of the most costly kind, executed by the first masters, many of them copies of originals which Isawin the Louvre or in the British Museum. The great hall, which from the entran ce seemed to me about 20 by 30 feet, is filled with vases and statuary. Its contents must represent a val ue of not less than ?800,000. We were not less than three hours passing through the rooms. The finish is exquisite, and the furnish ing of each sumptuous. Some idea may be formed of the whole from the furniture of a single bedroom, one of the many great chambers, costing ?25,000 or ?30,000. in the dining room and baronial hall ar'e furnishing exceeding ?200,000 each. Costly cabinets of the time of Louis XIV. of ebony inlaid with ivory or gol<d; jewelled blocks, made of solid gold, dia monds, rubies and all sorts of pre cious stones; walls hung with the costliest tapeswy of Louis XIV., or covered with the richest needle embroidered satin, may give some idea of the wealth lavished on this more than princely mansion. The costliest paintings adorn the walls, and the most skillful and expensive workmanship is display ed upon the ceilings. The idea of the Baron seems to have been to build and furnish a mansion such as no other person in England, except perhaps the Duke of West minister, could hope to rival. The stad is said to contain more high bed horses than any in the ADVIkRTISINC RATESVL- '_'--:* Advertisements Inserted at the ate or per square-one inch-borima lnsut,ad4 P 756. for each subsequent insertion.. Do*W ---- column adveniftneits tenpercetonabvq. . Notices of meetings,obftnpries and Uthif of respect, same rates per square as ordli.a7 advertisements. Special notices In local. coW=m 15. cente perline, Advertisements.not marked whth the =W. ber of Insertions will be kept in lIM forlAU and charged accordinely. Special contract made wfth larg zdier-'. tisers, with liberal deductdons on 06om rateg Done with Nqeatnewsand Diqpa&ch Terms CWsh world. It embraces tbir;Y-fiV. huanters and as many racers& Non&'4 of which I heard we r6as i v4e than ?600, while many.of them run up into the thouad& Favonous,Maccaroni,and Old Tom4 the last patriarch of high bred ra cers we saw, all winners of famous races. For Favonions X12,000 were refused, and for Maccaroni ?7,10.0. were but recently paid. [St. Louis Times. ALL ABOUT ADVERTISINGo Of course all newspapers Want* advertisements, just as all -Mer chants desire to sell goods-just' as all manufacturers desire ordersl for their wares-just as &W far.,. mers desire customers for their -- produce-jast as all laborers. de sire a position in' which' they can get an equivalent for thdfr a bor. The solicitor for aviie- - ments is not in any sense.a differ ent man from him who-wits upolL you for an order for goods, and--,_ yet he is generally considere~ I did tink dat Jake had by him self some sense; but~ von he go away mit Eattarine I tink he was i nothing better as a fool."