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lewis m. grist, proprietor. f*jVn jiulrpeiuhu .ifamili; Mm-spaprr: fJfor the fjmmotimof the political, skicial. Inrittiltiirat and (i'oinmiMcial jntordfi of tlif ?ouih. " a VOL. 35. ? YORIvVILLE, S. O., WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1889. JSTO. 7. i JONATHAN AND BY MAX O'RELL , Translated by Mme. Paul Blouet. Cop We Publish the Following Extri rangement through the A Paul Blouet (Max O'Rell) is a remarkably ents mostly to satirizing the Anglo-Saxon ra( of "John Bull and His Island," "John ' duction, the material for it being gathered CHAPTER I. The population of America is sixty millions ?mostly colonels. If the earth is small t America is large, and the Americans are immense! Yes, sixty millions!?all alive and kick'ngl Ffcom east to west, America stretches over a breadth of more than 8,000 miles. Here it is well to put some readers on their guard, Jft case an American should one day put to ^ them ono of bis favorite questions: "Where is the center of America P I myself imagined that, starting from New York and pushing westward, one would reach the extremity of America on arriving at San Francisco. Not so. and here Jonathan has you. He knows you are going to answer wrongly, and if you want to please him, you must let yourself be caught in this little trap, because it will give him such satisfaction to put you right. At 8&n Francisco, it appears you are not quite half way, and the center of America is really in the Pacific ocean. Jonathan more than doubled the width of his continent in 1867, when for the stun of $7,000,000 he purchased Alaska of the Russians. In America, everything is on an immense scale: the just pride of the citizens of the Young Republic is fed by tho grandeur of its rivers, mountains, deserts, cataracts, its suspension bridges, its huge cities, etc. Jonathan passes his life in admiration of all that is American. He cannot get over it 1 have been through part of the country, and 1 cannot get over it either. 1 am out of breath, turned topsy-turvy. It is pure conjuring, it is Robert Houdin over again? ?occasionally perhaps Robert Macaire too? but let us not anticipate. Give me time to recover my breath, and set my ideas in order. These Americans are reeking with unheardof-ness, I can tell you that to begin with. My ideas are all jostling in my poor old European brain. There is no longer anything impossible, and the fairy tales are child's play compared to what one may see every day. Everything is prodigious, done by steam, by electricity: it is dazzling, and I no longer wonder that the Americans only use their adjectives in the superlative. As an illustration of what 1 advance, here is a letter that 1 received from an American, in the mouth of May, 1S87, and which finally decided me to go and see America. It is dated from Boston: "Dear Sir?I was on the point of taking the boat at 12 today, to go and have a talk with you about an idea which occurred to me yesterday; bnt as I have already been across three times, and in a month or six weeks shall have to set out for St. fetersourg ana Japan, I am desirous, if possible, of arranging the matter I have at heart by correspondence." * "Good heaven I" I exclaimed, "this is a man 1 must make the acquaintance of; I must go and see Jonathan at home one of these days." And as soon as circumstances allowed, I packed my trunks, took a cabin on board one of the brave "White Star" liners, and set out When a man of average intelligence returns home after, having made a voyage to a foreign land, he cannot help having formed a certain number of impressions, and he has a right to communicate them to his friends. They are hut impressions, notes taken by the wayside, and. If there is an error committed by any one, it is by the critic or the reader, when either of these looks for a perfect picture of the manners and institutions of the people the author has visited, instead of simple impressions do voyage. Certainly, if there Is a country in the world that it would be impossible to judge in six months, that country is America, and the author who, in such a little space of time, allowed himself to fall into the error of sitting in judgment upon her would write himself down an ass. To form a really exact idea of America one would need to live twenty years in the country, nay, to be an. American, for 1 may add that, in my opinion, the best books that exist upon the different countries of the world Lave been written by natives of those countries. Never has an author written of the English like Thackeray; never have the .Scotch been painted with such fidelity as by Ramsay; and to describe Tartarin it needed HE not only a Frenchman but a Provencal, almost a Tarasconnais. It must bo allowed that Jonathan has good I' KJ reason to mistrust his critics. Most books on A mprira have been written by Englishmen. 'l Now the English oro, of all people, those 5 who can the least easily get rid of their prejudices in speaking of America. They are obliged to admit that the Americans have ? made their way pretty well since they have f been their own masters; but John Bull has always a rankling remembrance, when he looks at America, of the day that the Ameri'I rang sent him about his business, and his look I 6oems to say to Jonathan: "Yes, yes, yoi I have not done at all badly?for you, but jusl m think what the country would have been bj i j. this time if it had remained in my hands." Tbo Englishman, on his side, has no antip athy whatever to the Americans. For thai matter the Englishman has no antipathy foi I any one. He despises, but he does not hate a fact which is irritating to the last degre< B- f to the objects of his attention. When a mai B . feels that ho lias some worth, he likes to tx B & loved or hated, to be treated with indiffer B |v ence is galling. John Bull looks on the Ameri B | can as a parvenu, and smiles with incredulity Hi* - 9m when you say that American society is uo B if only brilliant and witty, but quite as polishes B f as the best Eurojiean society. t? It is this haughty disdain which exasperate B i A Americans. ^Bkjr^B?Jonatffkn has forgotten' that the Englisl B weroonce his oppressors; he forgives then m(/\ for the war of 1S12; without forgetting it B^if ? ho forgives them for having, during the civi BJ I war, sided with the slave owners; but ho can I not forgive on Englishman for coming to hi B I dinner table is a tweed suit. * CHAPTER IIL M A nation, scarcely more than a hundra Bp years old, and composed of many widely dif Bi ferent elements, cannot, in the nature o I s things, possess very marked characteristii BrV traits. B^ Tliere are Americans in plenty, but thi ||P American does not yet exist. Bh The inhabitant of the northeast states, th f Yankee, differs as much from the western man and the southerner as the Englishma] differs from the German or the Spaniard. For example, call a Yankee "a cad," an* he will get out of the room, remarking . "You say so, sir, but that proves nothing. ; Call a Pennsylvania man "a cad" and he wi] . get out of temper and knock you down. Ca] 1 a real westerner "a cad" and he will get ou his revolver and shoot you dead on the spol Should a minister indulge in unorthodo theories in the pulpit, the eastern mnn wi content himself with shaking his head, an going to another church to perform his d? votions the Sunday after. The Pennsylvania will open a violent polemic in the newspaper I of the locality. The Kansas man will wai I for the minister at the church door and giv him a sound thrashing. On board the steamer we had five Amer cans who passed the eight days of the voyag in playing poker. The smoking room ran from morning to night with the oaths the they uttered every time they laid a card o the table. They were so fluent with thei that they hardly used the same twice in a hoar. Their stock seemed inexhaustible. 0 Sunday after breakfast a young lady st down to the piano, and began playing hymn What happened then? Our five poker pla; ers gathered round the lady and, for tw hours, sang psalms and holy hymns to tl HIS CONTINENT. AJSTD. JACK ALLYN. lyrighted by Cassell & Co., New York, icts from this Book by Special Armerican Press Association. r clever Frenchman, who has devoted his talHe has become widely known as the author Bull, Jr.,',' Etc. This book is his latest produring his recent visit to America edification of the other occupants of the salooa ,* I was ddmfounded. In France we have men who swear, and men who sing hymns. The Anglo-Saxon race alone ran - furnish men who do both with equal gusto. In what other country than America could such an anecdote as tue following be toldf It is the most typically American anecdote I beard in the United States. It came from Mr. Chauncey Depew, it is said. Snt, for that matter, when a good story goes the rotmd of the states, it is always put down to Mr. Depew, Mark Twain, or the late Artemus Ward. A new minister had been appointed in a little Kentucky town. No sooner had he taken possession of his cure than he set abo#ut ornamenting the church with stained glass windows of gorgeous huea This proceeding aroused the suspicions of several parishioners, who imagined that their new pastor was inclined to lead them to Roma A meeting was palled, and it was decided to send a deputation to the minister to ask him to explain his conduct, and beg him to have the offending windows removed. The head of the deputation was an old man of Presbyterian proclivities, whose austerity was well kuown in the town. He opened fire by addressing the reverend gentleman thus: "We have waited upon you, sir, to beg that you will remove those painted windows from our church as soon as possible We are simple folks, God's own light is good enough for us, and we don't want to have it shut out by all those images" The worthy man had prepared a fine har-. angue, and was going to give the minister the benefit of it all; but the latter, losing patience, thus interrupted him: "Excuse me, you seem to be taking high ground; who tire you, may I askf "Who am I?" repeated the good old spokesman. "I'm a . meek and humble follower of Jesus, that's what I am, and, ? d n you, who are you?" Without traveling very far, without even quitting the eastern coast of America, you will see a complete difference in the spirit of towns that are almost neighbors. In New York, for instance?lam not speaking now of the literary society, of which I shall speak later?in New York, it is your money that will open all doors to you; in Boston, it is your learning; in Philadelphia and Virginia, it is your genealogy. Therefore, if you wish to be a success, parade your dollars in Now York, your talents in Boston, and your ancestors in Philadelphia and Richmond. Scarcely has a foreigner set foot in the United States before they ask him what he thinks of the country. Nine persons out of every ten you speak to put these three questions tp you: (1) "Is this your first visit to America?" (2) "How long have you been over?" (3) "How do you like our country?" There are even some who push curiosity further, and do not wait until you have arrived to ask for your opinion on America I had only just embarked'on board, the' _ handed me a letter from Now York. I opened it and read: "Dear Sir?Could you, during your voyage, write mo an article on the United States! I should bo happy to have your preconceived notions of America and the Americans, so as to publish them in my journal s soon as you i no streets, m paveu uuuuui,y, umuau^cioiis in winter. Coachmen do not check their horses for foot passengers, but neither do they try to run over them. They strike the middle course between the London coachman, who avoids them, and the Parisian one, who aims at them. The populous quarters, such as tho Chinese quarter, tho Italian quarter, tho Jewish quarter, with their tenement houses, thoso barracks of tho poor which I visited ono day in company with a sanitary engineer, remind one of come of Dante's descriptions: it is a descent, or rather an ascent, into helL I sparo the reader the impressions which that day left upon me. Horrible I A populace composed of the offscourings of all nations, tho dirtiest, roughest one can imagine. Hard by this frightful squalor, Fifth avenue, with its palaces full of tho riches of tho earth. It is the eternal story of largo citiea As in London, hundreds of churches and taverns (called beer saloons), it i3 tho saino ignoble Anglo-Saxon mixture of Diblo and beer, of spiritual and spirituous. Now York is probably the most cosmopolitan city in tho world. To give an idea of it, I may tell you that there aro newspapers published there in English, French, German, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Dutch, Hungarian, Chinese and Hebrew. I received ono day a circular of a meeting of the "Knights of Labor." It was printed in six different languages. Nothing is more diverting than to hear tho dwellers of each great American town criticise tho dwellers in tho others. All these societies, each almost in its infancy as yet, aro jealous ono of another. At Boston, for instance, you will bo told that the Chicago peoplo aro all pig stickers and pork packers. In Chicago, you will hear that Boston is composed of nothing but prigs and "precieuses ridicules." Tho English spoken in Boston is purer than any to bo heard elsewhere in tho north. Tho voices aro less harsh and nasal, tho language ceases to bo "vurry, vurry Amurracan." If you think yourself iu England us you walk arrive." An Englishman or a Frenchman will never ask you what you think of Englmd or Franca The Frenchman does not doubt ihat his country is beyond competition. If le enter into the subject at all, it is to cong-atulate thd stranger upon coming to visit it. The Englishman is perfectly persuaded that his England is the first cointry in tho world and that everybody admit it, and the Idea of asking an outsider for hs opinion of it would never enter his head. He would think it so ridiculous, so amushg, so grotesque, that any one should tell hm England was not at the head of all natias, that he would not tako the trouble to rsent it Ho would pity the person, and tho natter would go no further. CHAPTER IV. Tho American men are genrally thin. Their faces glow with intellgence and energy, and in this mainly coisists their handsomeness. Tho features are bony, the forehead straight, the nose sharp and often pinched looking in its thinness. A times one seems to recognize in the faces somthing of , tho Indian type, the temples inentcd, the cheek bones prominent, the eyes aiall, keen i and deep sot i As for tho women, I do not hesitto to say i that in the cast, in New York tpecially, i they might perfectly well be tken for , French women. It is tho same type, he same . gait, tho same vivacity, the same ptulanco, : tho same amplitude of proportions, i The beauty of tho American woien, like t that of tho men, is due much more tahe anir mation of the face than to form or Coring. The average of good lx?ks is veryjgh, in. deed. I do not remember to have >en one 5 hopelessly plain woman during ny six months' ramble through the states. American women generally enjy that 9 second youth which nature bestows ilso on i numbers of French women. At 0 they 5 bloom out into a more majestic beau/. The . eyes retain their fire and luster, the tin does . not wrinkle, the bands, neck and .-ms rer main firm and white. It is trutthat in t America hair turns gray early, hi, so far 1 from detracting from the woman's Qirms, it gives her an air of distinction, andis often s positively an attraction. The New Yorkers and Bostonif "p"1] bav^ _ 3 it to be that Chicago women havtuormous * 3 feet and hands. I was willing to Sieve this ,t up to the day I went to Chicago I found 1 the Chicago women, and those o the west . generally, pretty, with more coloraan their eastern sisters, only, as a rule, quitdight, not to say thin. That which is lacking in tho prey American faces o? the east is color ancfreshness. The complexion is pale, and it ifnly their * plumpness which comes to their scue after 80 and prevents them from loohg faded. p Those who remain thin generally f;o quickly; " the complexion becomes the colc of whity brown paper, and wrinkles freely 9 If American women went in I- more out door exercise; if they let the our air peno0 trate constantly into their rans; if they 3 gave up living in hothouses, thewould have 3 some color, and their beauty cd perhaps fear no competition in Europe. CHAPTER V. " Jonathan admires all that .tters, even 11 that which is not gold. In huyes the suc11 cess of a thing answers for itquality, and t the charlatanism that succeeds: superior to i, the merit that vegetates. Thaollar is not x only the unit of the monetary-stem; it is 11 also the unit of the metrical syjm. d I was chatting one day witkn American y about the famous Col Robert gersolL n "He is your greatest oratol am told," I s said. it "Yes," he replied, "Ingersi can All tho e Metropolitan opera house an;ay, and have five thousand dollars in tho hto." i- CXrtainly that is a curiovway to speak ;e of a great orator, a great wtr and a great i g thinker. j it I need not say that I am w speaking of n the average American, not t litterateur or n the man of good society, n It would bo quite possibler an actress to n attract large audiences olihrough a tour it from New York to San Incisco, not bos. cause of incontestable calerbut because she 7- traveled in a magnificent dace car of her -o own. i le I saw, In an American per, tho appear ance of Miss Minnio Palmer spoken of in the following terms: "Minnie Palmer will wear all her diamonds In the third act" The booking office was besieged all day, and, in the evening, money was refused. An amusing detail was the arrival of a good fourth of the audience at 10 o'clock, to see the diamonds in the third act CHAPTER VX Man has been perpetuated to expiate the transgression of his first parent by hard labor. Jonathan is a proof of it He labors, he toils, and the sweat of his brow crystallizes upon the arms and nock of his beloved womankind in the form of diamonds. To the American woman the diamond is not an object of luxury, it is an object of prime necessity An English old maid would do without her tea before on American woman would go without diamonds. If good style consists in not doing what the vulgar do, good style in America ought to consist for one thine in wearing no diamonds ?unless democracy should demand this sign of equality. When you see diamonds in the ears of shop girls and factory gir^ they are sham gems bought with welhearn&i-aioney, or real ones bought with badly earned money. Love of woman, innate in the American, is not enough in itself to explain the luxury that man lavishes on her in the' United States. America is not the only country where man is devoted to woman and ready to satisfy all her caprices. The Frenchman is as keenly alive to her influence as the American, if not more. The luxury of the American women must be explained in another way. Money is easily earned in the United States, and is freely spent Business savors more of gambling than of commerce in the proper senso of the word. Jonathan, then, is in a position much like that of a man whom 1 saw give a hundred franc note to a beggar one day in the streets of Monte Carlo. "If 1 win at trente-et-quarante," said be to some one who asked him how he could do such a foolish thing, "what are a hundred francs to met I can afford to be generous to a poor fellow creature out of it; if 1 lose, it is so much that the croupiers will not get" When Jonathan covers his wife with diamonds, he says to himself, "If I win, 1 can indulge my wife without inconveniencing myself; if I lose, it is so much saved from the frav." This is not all. If the American thirsts after money, it is not for the love of money, as a rule, but for the love of that which money can buy. In other words, -avarico is a vice almost unknown in America. Jonathan does not amass gold for the pleasure of adding pile to pile and counting it He pursues wealth to improve his position in life and to surround those dependent upon him with advantages and luxuries. He spends his money as gayly as ho pockets it, especially when it is a question of gratifying his wife or daughters, who are the objects of his most assiduous atten tioiL Ho is the first to admit that their love for diamonds is as absurd as it is costly, but he is good humored, and says: "Since they like them, way should they not have them?" CHAPTER VIL The large cities do not constitute the real America. To gain a correct idea of the country one must go and see those hundreds?1 bad almost said those thousands?of flourishing little towns which spring up day by day on that immense continent It is no use looking in Now York for monuments in the sense which we attach to the word in Europe. There are massive buildtogs, a few handsome churches, but nothing which arrests your gaze. The houses in the best part of the city are built of brown stone ^Branny are of red brick, with green shutters on the outside. The streets are horribly ill paved. From my windows, which looked 011 Madison square, the carriages appear to riso and fall as if on a troubled sea. Drunkards have had to drop their habits; they could not reach home from the beer saloons. Three fine squares alone break the monotony of all these parallelograms of streets: Washington square. Union squaro and Madison square. That which strikes the visitor to New York is not the city itself, but the feverish activity which reigns there. Overhead is a network of telegraph and telephone wires, on the ground a network of tram car rails. It is estimated that there are more than 12,000 miles of telegraphio wires suspended over the heads of the passers by; about enough to go half round the world. The whistles of the boats that ply between New York and Brooklyn on the East river, and between New York and Jersey City on the Hudson, keep up, day and night (tntil 1 in the morning), a noise which is like the roar of wild beasts. It is the cry of Matter under the yoke of Man. You fancy you are living in a menagerie. In almost every street tram cars pass every few minutes. It is an incessant procession. In Broadway alone there are more than three hundred. The cars, as they are always called in America, are magical, like everything American. Built to carry twenty-four persons inside (there are no seats on the top), they aro made to hold sixty and more. In fact, no matter how full they are, there is always room for ono mora The conductor UOVUI I'dUdCS IAJ 1UU JUU UU UUCUU. XWU hong on tho rail besido the driver or conductor, if it is not possible to squeeze yourselI inside and hold on to tho leather straps provided for the purpose; you gasp for breath; it is all you can do to get at your pocket to extract the five cents which you owe to the car company; but the conductor cries,in his imperturbable nasal drawl: "Move forward, make room." In Third avenue and Sixth avenue, you find the overhead railway called the "Elevated." It is supported on iron pillars, and the trains run along on the level with the upper windows of tho houses. This company carries every day tho fabulous number of 500,000 passengers. All tho existing means of transit are acknowledged to bo insufficieet, and an underground railway is talked of. There will soon bo travelers underground, on tho ground, and in the air. Poor Hercules, where are you "7<"ni bad reckoned jSSEou^ourxanlme. along the streets, the illusion becomes com! ploto when you hear tho well bred people speak. All tho anecdotes told in America on tho subject of Boston are satires upon the presumptuous character of the Bostonian, who considers Bostou the center of the universe. Hero is one out of tho many hundreds I have heard. A Boston man has lost his wife. As soon as telephonic communication is established between that city and Paradise, he rings and cries: "Hello I" "Hello!" from the other encL I "Is that you, Artemisia?" "Yes, dear." "Well, my lovo, and how do you like it up there P' "Oh, it is very nice, of course?but it isnt Boston." Washington is the sole American city which has monuments that can strike the European with admiration for their beauty. The Capitol, the government buildings, tho museums, built in the midst of handsome gardens, all arrest tho eye of the visitor. 9 The Capitol, 7??1 feet long, built of white marble, with a superb dome and majestic ! flights of steps, is one or the grandest, most imposing looking edifices in the world. The souvenirs attached to it and the treasures 1 which it contains render it dear to the Ameri- 1 cans; it is a monument which recalls to their ' minds the glories of the past, and keeps alight 1 the flume of patriotism. I A general, who served through the great 1 civil war, told mo he had seen strong men, soldiers brought up in remote states, sit down and weep with strong emotion at seeing the Capitol for tho first tima * ' W ashington is wholly given over to politics. When congress is not sitting, it is dead; when congress is sitting, it i3 delirious. Little or no commerce Is dona Philadelphia, formerly the capital of the United States, is a city of eight or nine hundred thousand inhabitants, and is built, like New York, in parallelograms. Its town hall is, next to the Capitol at Washington, the finest edifice in America. I do cot know j anything to compare to its splendid park, ' unless it be the Bois do Boulogne in Paris. The alleys of this park, if put together, would cover about sixty miles in length. Seen after New York or the busy western cities, Philadelphia strikes one as slow, even monotonous j ?except on the Clover club annual banquet . evening. This Quaker city of quiet streets and sober people is, however, full of all kinds of manufactories. I On the shores of Lake Michigan there stood ) a town, built of wood, and peopled by some hundred thousand inhabitants. This was j called Chicago. Oa the evening of Oct. 8, 1871, a cow that . an old woman was milking in a barn kicked over a lamp and set fire to the structure. The , flames spread, dbd on the morrow of that terrible night the whole city was level with the j ground. The Chicago people of today show, as a curiosity to the visitor, the only wooden j house which escaped the flames. ( At the present time this city, the living and gigantic emblem of the phoenix, stands re- j built in hewn stone, and holding 800,000 in- | habitants. < Such is America. , In less than twenty years Omaha, Denver, ( Kansas City, Minneapolis will be so many , Cbicagos. Cincinnati, St Louis, Louisville j will rival her in five. , Chicago is, in my eyes, the very typo of the , American city, the most striking example of ( what Jonathan calls "go-aheadism." ] The streets are twice as wide as the Parisian j boulevards; the houses of business are eight, ten and twelve stories high. Michigan avenue is seven miles long; the numbers of the house? run up to 8,000 and something. The statues, including a splendid quo of Abraham 1 Lincoln, public buildings Imposing in their massiveness, fine theatres and churches, luxurious clubs, hotels inside which four good sized Parisian ones could dance a quadrille, etc., eta ? Michigan avenue and Prairie ayenuo are extremely handsome. Picture to yourself the avenue of the Bois do Boulogne, prolonged for seven miles in a straight lino, and imagine j the effect, the beautiful vista, when this is lit , up at night, or when the troes, with which ] both Iheso grand roads ore planted, are in all ( their fresh spring beauty. In these avenues, American eccentricity \ has been allowed free play. The houses are \ built in all imaginable styles of architecture: i some of them are Florentine, some English, others Moorish, others a mixture of all three; \ others again look like Greek temples, whilst | here and there you come across what looks ^ like a little Gothic church, and close along- j side media: val castles in miniature, or imita- j tion mosques; some have the look of villas in the Paris suburbs, some have been modeled i upon Swiss chalets, others upon the residence j of some pasha on the borders of the Bos- i phorus. There are styles for all tastea The American may be eccentric, or what ( you will, but he is never monotonous. ( Enter one of these houses, and you will see ^ handsome furniture, not only rich, but in ) good taste. j I was not astonished to find Chicago society i genial, polished and well read. Riches beget j tho taste for literature and arts; perhaps one t day it will begot tho taste for simplicity. f You find here still more warmth and much 1 less constraint than in the east. You feel { tnai you nave quit too returns 01 now rmgland Puritanism. No frigidity hero; people give free play to their sentiments. If I had to name the most sympathetic of my American audiences, tho warmest and promptest to seize tho significance of a look or gesture, I should name tho one which I had tho honor of addressing in Chicago. At 7 in tho morning every man is astir and at work, whether ho bo millionaire or poor clerk. Only the idle are outside the pale of respectability in Chicago. I do not think it is possible for a European to imagine the activity which reigns in Chicago without seeing it "You will soon be inventing," I said to a resident, "a machine that will take a live rabbit at ono end and turn out a chimney pot hat at the other." "We have done something very like it already," ho replied. And next*morning ho took mo to see the famous pig killing and pork packing premises of Philip Armour & Co. Picture to yourself a series of rooms connecting. In tho first, 5,000 pigs a day are killed; in tho second, they are scraped as they come out of a caldron of boiling water; in tho third, the heads are cut off; and so on, and so on. Tho process is somewhat sickening, and I will not enter into any more details. At the end of tho establishment the poor pigs are presented to you under the forms of bacon, sausage, gelatine, etc. Tho various processes take place with all tho rapidity of conjuring. CHAPTER VTIL American houses are furnished very luxuriously, and for the most part with exquisite tasto. Ilero you see tho influenco of woman in tho smallest details of life; indeed, at every step you tako, you seo that woman has passed that way. Tho luxury displayed at receptions, dinners and dances surpasses European imagination. At a ball given in New York in the month of February, 1888, the walls wero covered with roses, which did not cost less than 810,000. When one considers that tho supper, and everything else, was on tho same scaio, it becomes doubtful whether such luxury is to bo admired. I was present ono evening at a dinner given in the largo dining hall at Delmonico's restaurant, in Now York. We wero eighty-seven guests at an immense round tublo. Tho center of tho board was covered with a gigantic star of flowers: roses, arum lilies, and heliotrope. At that season, lilies were worth a dollar each, and r all through the winter tho firico of roses was v from a quarter to two dollars apiece, accord-, s ing to kind. Tho Americans at this feast estimated tho star of flowers at six or seven thousand dollars. At a dinner party given recently at Del- v monico's, I heard that each menu had a chain f attached, consisting of pearls and diamonds, and valued at SI,000. In houses, in clubs, in offices one cannot J help admiring tho ingenious forethought, tho J tho wonderful caro with which tho smallest r wants and the slightest conveniences of life J lave been studied, it seems as if there were lothing left to desire. It is impossible, however, in speaking of American interiors, to pass over in silence a mrtain eyesore, which meets your sight at svery turn. The most Indispensable, it appears, the nost conspicuous at any rate, piece of furniture In America is the spittoon. All rooms ire provided with this object of prime necessity; you find one beside your seat in the trains, under your table in the restaurants; mpossible to escape tho sight of the ugly utensil In the hotel corridors there is a spittoon standing scntinol outside every door In public buildings the floors are dotted with them, and they form the 4ine all up the The Americans, used to these targets from the tender est age, are marvelously adroit at the use of them; they never miss their aim. . ['saw some really striking feats of marksmanship; but perhaps the best of all at the Capitol, in Washington. The supreme court of judicature was sitting. As I entered an advocate was launching thunders of eloquence. Ail at once he stopped, looked at a spittc tn which stood two partis off, aimed at it, and Kerrron?craaahk ?ptu! right in ^the 'buH'sjMM|^n on he t went with his harangrfcT'Tlooke^o Sfe0~fKlTT jeven judges and the public applaud and cry bravo I Not a murmur, the incident passed completely unnoticed. Probably there was sot a man in the hall who could not say to himself: "There's nothing in that, I could do is much." CHAPTER IX. A word about American aristocracy to bofin with. What, American aristocracy! Yes, certainly. I assure you that there exists in America social sanctuaries into which it is more difficult to penetrate than into the most exclusive mansions of the Faubourg Saint-Germain or jf Mayfair and Belgravia. There are in Philadelphia; in Beacon street,. Boston; in Washington square (north side), New York; in Virginia; in Canal street (right ride), New Orleans, Americans who look upon common mortals with much more pity and contempt than the Montmorencys of France cr the Howards of England. Th? AmprirMTiiL not having anv kinc to jive them titles of nobility, have created an aristocracy for themselves. This aristocracy boasts as yet no dukes, marquises, earls, or barons, but the blue blood is there, it appears ?Dutch blood as a rule?and that is sufficient. When a European nobleman arrives in the 3tates, the American aristocracy leave cards ipon him at the hotel where he has alighted. Be may perhaps be personally known to none; but all nobilities are kindred everywhere, it is an act of international courtesy, as it were, rhe European nobleman, who often goes to America for a doWered wife, Is much obliged So them, and returns all the visits paid him. A New York lady, who is quite an authority upon such matters, told me one day that society in New York was composed of only four hundred persons. Outside this company 3f elect, all Philistines. Money or celebrity may allow you to enter into this charmed circlo, but you will never belong to it You will bo in it, but not of it rhe lady in question entered also into very minute details on the subject of what she :alled the difference between "society people" md "people in societybut, in spite of all ier explanations, 1 confess 1 did not seize the delicate nuances she tried to convey. All I dearly understood was that the aristocracy if birth exists in America, not only in the brains of those who form part of it, but also in the eyes of their compatriots. The desire to establish an aristocracy of some sort was botjfcto haunt the breast of the Americans; the only thing that thgfrjgllars aeem^B^able money, plutocra^Tpro belong to tma it is lot sufficient to be a millionaire?you must, I un told, belong to a third generation of millionaires. Of such aro the Astors, the Vanierbilts and company. Three quarters of "nobility" are the necessary key of this little cvorld. The first generation makes the millions, the second generation is parvenue, the third is arrivee. In the eyes of these people to have from thirtyjor forty to fifty thousand dollars a year is to bo in decent poverty. To save two or three hundred thousand dollars i year is to bo in easy circumstances. The third aristocracy is the aristocracy of latent, literary ana artistic society, mis shird aristocracy Is incontestably the first, if pou will excuse the Hlbornianism. 1 do uot think that one could find auyivhere, or even imagine, a society more reined, more affable, more hospitable, more >vitty or more brilliant. I should like just lere to indulge in a string of adjectives after ;be fashion of Mme. de Sevigno. One of the consequences of the position ivhich woman takes in tho United States s, that in good American drawing rooms conversation is never dull. "If 1 were queen," exclaimed Mme. Re:amier one day, "1 would command Mme, le Stael to talk to me all day iong." One vould like to be able to give the same order ? plenty of American women. In their company conversation never flags and always renains within the domain of causerio; they ;lide lightly from one subject to another, extracting something fresh from each, pass !rom the serious to the gay, even to the frivoous without becoming commonplace, soar tgain to lofty heights, but do not disdain to :ome down to gossip for a minute or two; all ;his without a grain of affectation, but with i charm of naturalness that is delightfully vinning. French women aro the only ones I know vho can compare with the American lady in :harm of conversation, and even then I am ibliged to admit two things: that the Amerian women of intellectual society are often-nore natural than their French rivals, and hat they make less effort to charm. In a vord, with them you aro amiable without laving to bo gallant, and none of those itereotyped compliments, which so often spoil ;ho charm of a conversation between a man md a woman, aro expected of you. Tho Americans, and that in every station >f life, have almost always three names: one Christian name and two family ones: George [Washington Smith, Benjamin Franklin rones, William Tell Brown. 1 should not iavo been astonished to make the rwqueUtt**.mce of a Mr. Napoleon Bonaparte Robinson, rhe celebrities do not escape it any^more :han tho rest: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, lohn Greenleaf Whittier, Oliver Wendell aolmcs, Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Richard tVatson Gilder, James Russell Lowell, Ralph rrr.i_i. n ? TT \T7 l r> VYIUUO Liocrsuil, IlUUJJf VV {U U UfCUUUl , CiAi.t itc. Cau one not soo In these double names a ;itle which the father thinks he confers on lis child at the buptismal font? All now societies have the same weaklesses. On the morrow of the Revolution, lid we not call our children Epaminondas, 1 ueonidas, Darius, Napoloon, etc. ? Every American with the least self respect 1 s colonel or judge. Few escape it, as Mark Twain once renarkod of the decorations of the Legion of 1 donor. We are quits, Mark. America has i i hundred times as many colonels as wo have mights of the Legion of Honor. 1 When you are presented to a gentleman, in 1 in American drawing room, and you have infortunately not caught his name, there is to need to try and repair the evil; call him ^Colonel," nine times out of ten it is 6afe; if uck should be against you, call him "Judge," ind you are pretty sure to be right. 1 If, however, pursued by the fates, you honld discover that your interlocutor is 1 leithcr colonel nor judge, you have another esourco; call him "Professor," and you are lut of the difficulty; an American always# irofesses something, an art, a religion, and ' rou are risking nothing. I met a few American colonels who had ] ocently been promoted "misters." They 1 vero so proud of their new title that they in- 1 isted on being addressed thua CHAPTER X. I am afraid it will make my readers' lips vater, but hero is a list of some American ortunes as 1 havo heard them stated: Revenue at 5 Name. Capital per cent. .Gould 8275,000,000 $13,750,000 . W. Mnckay 200,600,000 12,500,000 \ Vanderbilt 125,000,000 0,250,000 1. P. Jones 100,000,000 5,000,000 . J. As tor 00,000,000 4,500,000 ..Asa A. T Stewart 40,000,000 2,000.000 J. 0 Bennett .... 80.000,000 1.000.000 These oro the princes of the Land of tho Dollar Tho largest English fortunes fall short of these figures. The Duke of Westminster's is reckoned at oiJy $80,000,000, that of the Duke of Sutberlana"ht $30,000,000, tho Dukoof Northumberland has $25,000,000, and tho Marquis of Bute $20,000,000. It is in mines and railways especially that the colossal American fortunes havo been mode. I have not seen the town house or the country house of Mr. Gould; but I know that in the grounds of tho latter stand conservatories estimated to be worth $250,000. I trust this will give an idea of what tho rest may be. I cannot guarantee that Mr. Gould is a happy man. Concerning immense fortunes a A mnniann rlpll In mftH Arflflfm _ and a great philosopher, said tome one day: "No man can own more than a million dollars. When his bank account outgrows that, ho docs not own it; it owns him, and ho becomes its slave." Tho Americans, having no king in our sense of the word, make tho [most of thoso they have, republicans though they be. To rend the pedigrees, published in full every jAo a death occurs in one of these rich families, is highly entertaining. A Mrs. Astor died whilo I was in America, and, after the enumeration of her charms and virtues, which wero man^, came the list of John Jacobs from whom her husband had sprung. Tho Astors wore all John Jacobs apparently, and wero mentioned as John Jacob 1, John Jacob II and John Jacob HL Tho lino does not go back very far, John Jacob I having gone to America as a poor emigrant early in this century, I believe, and laid tho foundation of tho present grandeur of his house by trading in furs. It will not do to inquire too closely into tho way in which some of America's millionaires have amassed wealth. Strango stories aro told of men so grasping that they stopped at nothing, even to the ruining of their own sons. When I saw Mr. Bronson Howard's clever play, "The Henrietta," in which he portrays a son so madly engrossed by tho oxrtitomanf frnmWinfr n? thcx cf/v?lr AYnhnnfrA as to try and absorb his father's millions, 1 thought the picture was overdrawn. Americans, however, told me that the case was historical, but with the characters reversed? which made it still more odious. As for the colossal fortunes of railway kings, it is well known how thousands of small ones go to make them, how the rich man's palace is too often built with the stones of hundreds of ruined homes. There Is no other name than "king'' used in speaking of the few great financiers, who hold the bulk of the railway stock in America. But tbey are not the only ones. There are oil kings, copper kings, silver kings, and I know not what other majesties in America, and when you see the power possessed by these, and the numberless tPusts, combinations and pools, a power pressing often very closely on the million, you wonder how the Americans, who found ono king one too many, should submit so patiently to ^>eing governed by scores. CHAPTER XL The liberty enjoyed by American girls astonishes the English as much as the liberty of the English girl surprises the French. From the ago of 18, the American girl is allowed almost every liberty. She takes the others. Sho can travel alone, and go to concerts and even to theatres unattended by a chaperon. She is supplied with pocket money, which she s]K5nds at her own sweet will in bonbons, knickknacks and jewelry. If there is none left for tho milliner and dressmaker, papa is coaxed to pay them. She visits and receives whom sho pleases?I ineaA thoso who please . '^rd^b^^sho^m^^wi^ifyfung^airwho takes her fancy, I do not say touches her heart, sho says to him: "lam at home on such a day, come and seo mo." Next day ho may send her a ticket for a theatre and bo ? :? rr? nur ubuuri# iui tuu cvcuiu^. ao iuuj uxiu^ ber flowers, offer her refreshments after the play, and take hor home in a carriage. In America, all this seems to be tho most natural thing in tho world. This leads to no intimacy, for a few days later it may happen that ho meets the young lady at a ball, and she conies up to him, and says: "I want to present you to a friend; do tell mo your name, 1 quite forget it." Tho American girl, who appears to us French so giddy and even fast, seems to me to act according to the dictates of common sense. Tired of tho old formula, "A lady cannot' do that, it would be improper," she says: "I will do it, and if I choose to do it, it becomes proper." It is for woman herself to make the law on these matters. "Why should I not go to the theatre alone?" she says again, "if your streets ore impure, it is for you to cleanse them. Why should I not receive my ball partners who please mot If one of them were to profit by my seeing him alone in the drawing room to take a liberty with me, ho would be an ill bred fellow, and I should have him properly shown out of the house, and certainly it is not for such as he that I should change my habits." In trains, where the seats are constructed to hold two persons, you will see the American seek a place from one end of the train to the other before ho will go and seat himself by the side of a young girL He will only do so when thero is no help for it I have many times noticed men standing up in the local trains, rather than run the risk of incommoding a young girl by sharing a seat with her. And L^n not speaking now of gentlemen onW^^^tmen belonging to tho middle, if nojffower, clas%Htfh? word "class" may bojTsed speaking o^vtericanaXvith what pleashro lYomomber the young Smerican girls w'bofti i occasionally met at Parisian partici in my youthful days. Their pretty, brigh.- faces, tbeir elegance, their unconventional charm of manner and animated, natural conversation?all these enchanted me. One never felt awkward with them. Whereas with a French young girl I could generally find notliing but absurd commonplaces to say, in tho presence of Jonathan's merry maidens 1 lost my timidity, and could chat away with as little embarrassment as I would with a young brother officer of my regiment. The AniQj^Ai^drl is still-without rivals in Parisian drawin^l^oms, where sho is more and more sought after. Meu seek her for her gayety, nit or beauty; mothers look favorably upon her for her dollars, tho younger women tear her to shreds?nothing is waiting to her success. * And what spirit thero was in their danclntr! What animation! What eves lit UD with pleasurol Not a moment's flagging: they danced with as much suppleness at 5 In the morning as at tho beginning of the evening. And why not, indeed* Such pleasures ire harmless, and it is uot because a v man has danced much in her girlhood that sho should lead her husband a dance, when sho has one. Good scholars are as easy to disc ewer in the recreation ground as in tho class room. Tho morality of a youth is in direct proportion to tho delight ho takes in play; that of a girl may bo measured by her gayety and high spirits. I shall nover forget a young American girl who sat at tho samo table as myself on board tho steamer. The dear child, who was about 17, performed prodigies. I could scarcely betiovo my eyes, and watched her with nover [lagging interest What appetite I What a little tablo d'hote ogress! I trombled for our supplies and wondered whether tho company had foreseen tho danger. First of all, at 7 in tho morning, tea and bread and butter was taken to tho hungry one in her cabin. At half-past 8 sho breakfasted. At this meal, sho generally went straight through tho bill of faro. At 11, sho hod beef tea and biscuits brought to her on deck. Lunch time found her ready for three courses of solid food, besides pastry, fruit, etc. At G o'clock, sho did valiantly again, and at 10 sho was regularly served with a Welsh rarebit, or somo other tasty trifle, j Notwithstanding this, I rarely met her on deck, or in tho corridors, but sho was munch- : ing sweets, gingerbread or chocolate. After all, there are so fow distractions on ! board ship! Men smoke, play poker, or in- ! dulgo hi a littlo betting on tho run of tho ship. Somo people sleep, somo try to think, but unsuccessfully; others read; somo ladles knit. -The American girl eats. Tho American girl likes men's society for j several reasons. First, becauso sho is well j educated and ablo to talk on almost all topics. | Sho con talk knickknacks and pretty non- j sense, but if sho knows bow to describo tho I "cunningest bonnet" lately invented in Paris, sho can also tell you all about Octavo Feuillot's latest novel, or even Herbert Spencer's latest work. Sho likes men's society, because it eulargcs her circle of acquaintances, and ! also becauso it increases her chances of mak- j ing a good match. No matter how much of a butterfly sho may bo, sho never loses sight of tho future. Sho does not say, as she sits musing on marriago: "What kind of man shall 1 suitf but "What kind of man shall 1 1 chooso?" Tho constant aspiration of theso young re- I publicans is to bo one day countess, marchion- j ess or duchess. Tho number of- European coats of arms which have been taken out of pawn, or re- j gilt, with American dollars, is enormous. Not long ago, a writer on tho staff of Tho Paris Figaro counted, among tho guests in ono of the most select drawing rooms of tho Faubourg Saint-Germain, thirty-seven Amer- I ican ladies bearing thirty-seven names of tho most authentic French nobility. To namo only tlloso which nro present at tho moment ! in my memory, the ih-incesso Murat, mother of tho Duchesse do Mouchy, is American; tho Marquiso do Chasseloup-Laubat is American; the Comtcsso do Saint-Ronan, la Generale do Charette, the Comtesso do Chevigno and tho Comtesso do Ganay are Americans. Tho daughters of tho great democracy have become not only French in heart, but as royalist as the most ultramontano of our eld dowagers. Every ono knows how many American women tho English aristocracy counts in its bosom, and that that most Tory and most powerful political association, called the Primrose league, originated with Lady Randolph Churchill, tho young and handsome daughter of Mr. Jerome of Now York. That passion for rich marriages, which burns in tho heart of so many young American women, often leads them to disastrous results. If ono may trust one's eyes, American law allows young girls to marry their grandfathers, or at least the contemporaries of these worthies. It is not rare, I may say it is quite common, to see girls of 18 and 20 married to men of TO and over. An American told me that ho once went a long journey in tho same railway car with an infirm, hoary old man of 80, who was accompanied by a girl of scarce more than 20. This yo mg woman was strikingly beautiful. My American friend admitted to me that tho sight of her lovely face had tho effect of making him fall quite in love with her before their five days' journey was over. He did not have an opportunity of conversing with her, but on arriving at their destination, ho resolved to put up at the same hotel as the old man, so as to perhaps have a chance of making more ample acquaintance with his fair charge. To find out the name of the young girl and her venerable grandfather, he waited to sign his name in the hotel register, until the patriarch had inscribed his own. Imagine his feelings when he read: "Mr. X. and wife." Hero is a joke that I culled from a Washington paper." Is it a joke# "A bachelor lately advertised for a wife. A typographical error changed his ago from 87 to 87; but it made no difference, for bo received ovei 250 applications from ladies ranging from 10 to 00, and all promising love and devotion to tho rest of his existence." Here is another which 1 extract from a comic paper The author seems to believe that the American mother does not look on such marriages with displeasure: j "Mother?So "you" have engaged yourself T to Mr. Jones. You must be a goose. He has neither fortuno nor position. I know he may one day be well off; his grandfather may leavo him part of his fortune, perhaps. "Daughter?But, mnmma, it is his grandfather 1 am engaged to. "Mother?Kiss me, my child; you are an angel." The real American girl admires male qualities in man. The perfumed dandy, dressed in the latest fashion, the "dudo," as be is called in the States, is not her admiration; she prefers a little roughness to too much polish. At a large reception given in the New York Union League club in the early part of the year, I asked a young lady who were ten or a dozen young men who did not miss a single dance. "Ohf" she replied with an air of sovereign contempt, "a few young dudes who have been invited by the club just to keep up the dancing; marionettes, you know." [TO IJK CONTINUED.] JttisccUantous grading. THE FATAL KAIL. The judicial inquiry into the circum stances attendant upon the horribly sudden and strange deaths of three persons In the houso of the eminent Spanish electrical scientist, Senor J uan Mirenque, has just been concluded in Barcelona, Spain, and, as was expected, has resulted in the complete exoneration of Senor Mirenquo from all blame. At the same time there seems to be a tacit understanding in the community that in such finding the written law of the criminal code had been less considered than the unwritten law, that gives every man certain rights for the protection of his honor. The story of the case is a curious one. well worth narrating. Senor Mirenque is a man of {ull 55 years of age. a thorough scientist, engrossed most of the time in his studies and experiments. possessed of an almost childlike innocence of tho ways of the world, and both respected and beloved by all who know him. His fortune is ample and his social standing deservedly high. About seven years ago ho committed tho folly of marrying a very handsome young woman named Rosita Faranela, whoso mother was the widow of an army officer, between whom and Seuer Mirenque a lifelong friendship existed. Rosita, a girl of some 20 or perhaps 22 summers, was in herself a poor assurance of a quiet life to a husband then nearly 50 years old, and there is reason to believe that she very reluctantly bfecame his wife. Her mother, however, compelled her and wheedled liira so that tho illy mated pair wero matched. One of the witnesses in the recent proceedings went so far as to say very plainly that the young woman's conduct had been so ill guarded that her mother would have found difficulty in marrying her to any man in good society who was not so abnormally innocent and unsuspecting as Senor Mirenque. Be that as it may, the old scientist was quite infatuated wiihhis young wife, and, for a time at least, seemed very happy. Tho friend who called oftenest upon Senora Mirenque and was most frequently alono with her was Lieut. Rafael Zaga. On the 25d of September last tho "saints' day" of tho fair Rosita was celebrated by a grand feto in the elegant mansion of her husband. Tho spacious garden and tho conservatory wero so superbly decorated, by means of electric lights in colored giobes, flowers, drapery and other adjuncts of light and color, that they eonirinrl n nurtion of fairv land. A lino orchestra furnished the music for the dance The supper was one to bo remembered And tho scene was enhanced in its beauty and magnificence by the presence of tho most charming of Barcelona's fair ladies, escorted by caballeros of unquestionably tho best society of tho city, among whom Hosita moved like a queen as well as a most gracious hostess. Senor Mirenquo was present, of course, and it was felt to be no small condescension that, even upon such an occasion, ho had torn himself away from his laboratory. No one appeared to be happier than he, and even thoso who deemed that they had reason to suspect a scandal in the air had their s ispicions disarmed by the manifest cordiality, affection and confidence that ho demonstrated toward his young wife. Evidently, they thought, ho knew nothing, for ho smiled upon Lieut. Zaga and shook hands with him. as no consciously outraged husband could have done. One of the chief adornments in tho conservatory was a superb marblo bust? three-quarters of life size?of Senora Mirenquo, a birthday present from her affectionate husband. It stood in a semicircular spaco, backed by some rich tropical foliage, and was surrouuded by a_proA I tecting silver rail, the supports of which I were based ia its heavy marble pedestal. ! On ono side of it, near at hand, was the j entrance from the parlors; on the other ; side, a door that led to Senora Mirenque's privato apartments; and beyond, through a second conservatory, lay tho way to the gardens. Everyone had to pass tho bust, and all stopped to admire it as they went by. The feto was a complete success in every respect, and it was almost daylight when the last of the guests took their departure, and their host, a weary old man, was at liberty to retire to rest. But before going he was very careful about seeing personally to certain precautions. Tho electric currents that had been supplying tho lamps all the night had been furnished from powerful storage batteries, and no one kuew better than ho the dangers of those contrivances, so he saw to it himself that every one of tho batteries, was disconnected and left in such condition as to be absolutely harmless, gave tho strictest orders that nobody should touch batteries or wires, or anythingelse connected with the display until ho could personally supervise tho handling of them the next day, and then went off to bed In taking all this trouble ho had acted very prudently; for, while several of tho batteries had been completely exhausted and were as harmless as so many blocks of ice, there were others ^that had not beeu touched or drawn upon at all, and in which terrific energies were still bottled up. sufficient to kill many persons should they come in contact with the current. In view of his prudent care tho subsequent events wero all tho;more surprising and inexplicable Between 11 and 12 o'clock of the succeeding forenoon Lieut Zaga made a morning call upon Seuora Mirenque That was a favorite hour for his visits It was a time when the old man was almost absolutely certain to be hi the laboratory, when there wero not likely*to bo any other visitors, and when his interview with Rosita was least likely to be interrupted. Tho servant who admitted the lieutenant and went to announce him to her mistress left him in the parlors From there the young man strolled out into the conservatory. well knowing where he would meet the lady The gardener had evidently been watering tho plants. *for tho cement Hoor was quite wet The decorations of tho night before were still in place upon every hand, possibly looking a little tawdry in the daylight; but there was one. tho beautiful bust of his lovely mistress, of which the perfection might well challenge any illumination. Ho stepped toward it. laid his ungloved hand upon the rail lightly, and then?in that same iustant?dropped to the fjoor as if foiled by a bolt of lightning A moment afterward Senora Rosita, coming from her room into tho conservatory, saw tho body of her lover extended before her, and uttering a cry of alarm bent over him. supporting herself as she did so by placing a hand npon tho silver rail. As instantaneously as he had fallen so she fell, liko him, dead, her body thrown across his. Tho one shriek uttered by tho young woman was heard by her mother, who had been with her when she received the announcement of Lieut. Zuga's coming, and tho old lady, running out in affright to learn the cause of the alarm, screamed loudly when she saw tho two prostrate forms, and, doing exactly what her daughter had done?touching tho silver rail as a support?shared tho fate of the guilty couple, dropping dead with the same awful suddenness. Of course, no one saw these successive tragic occurrences, but the shrieks had been heard, and the manner in which tho bodies lay demonstrated clearly just what had happened, and that it must have been as has here been described. Hardly had the old woman fallen dead when three or four servants appeared upon the scene, and among them was Senor Mirenquo himself. He had just come down, he said, to superintend the removal of tho electrical appliances. x | His quick eyes and ready knowledge i discerned in an instant tne cause ui wu | ^allfUg 6hKI&iT,> ^-^g-eleStWi; xf^iTt Vfifgr " that in some inexplicable way had been broken, hung down to and rested upon the silver raU surrounding the bust, and as it was of uninsulated copper, made a perfect connection with it. And that wire, despite all the care with which ho had disconnected the storage batteries the night before, was connected with one of them?one of the most powerful of them, which had not been used at all the preceding night?and the switch was turned on so that the wire was vivified with the full, terrific and fatal force of the current. Why, it was asked on the investigation, had not the current, even under those conditions, found its metal conductors right down to the ground much more easy and attractive a course for its harmless discharge than through the human bodies that had fallen victims to it? For the simple and excellent reason, it was explained, that Senor Mirenque, in putting up the handsome bust of his wife, had had the good idea of placing beneatii it, between tho marble pedestal and the cement floor of the conservatory, a sheet of India rubber three-quarters of an inch in thickness. That was intended simply to prevent the marble from absorbing water from the frequently damp floor and becoming discolored by it; but it had ef fected tho perfect insulation of the ped estal, and tho only course open for tho deadly fluid was through the human body from tho rail down to the wet ground. Of course it was possible tnat senor Mirenque had overlooked that one storage battery and neglected disconnecting it, though he "hardly thought so." It was also possible that some mischievous fool, unconscious of the terrible trap he or she was setting, might have tampered with the battery that morning And it was not improbable that the gardener might have clumsily, and without noticing it, broken down the light wire that had fallen on the rail. Whether he had or not he could not say, for he was so stupid that he could not remember having, when he watered the flowers that morning, made tho floor so very wet as it was?a condition that completed the fatal cer tainty of tho trap. Tho judicial investigation tardily arrives at tho conclusion that the killing of those three persons was "an act of Providenco," and people say "right;" they add, "but what -a happy Providence that at one stroke relieves Senor Mirenque of an unfaithful wife, her lover and her wicked old mother, who shielded her immoralities!" A Cattle Ranch in Chihuahua. The high price of land in the range districts of the Uuited States has driven tho wiser cattle men to Mexico Land is ob tained here, for grazing purposes only, for twenty-five cents to fifty cerits per acre, which, if situated in Texas, would bring $5 per acre, while land suitable for graziug and including largo agricultural and timber areas, such as wo have in this portion of tho state, sells for seventy-five cents to $1 an acre, and would bring readily $10 per acre, did this country be long to the United States. Tlioso who have come here havo not regretted the move. Tho cheapness of labor?common cow hands getting $12 per month as against $30 or $40 in tho north?allows us to raise cattle cheaper thau there. Englishmen havo been quick to see the advantages of Chihuahua as a cattle stato, and they rank among tho owners of the largest estates in this state. They far outnumber tho Americans in cattle and acreage. A United States senator is the owner of 700,000 acres of the choicest grazing and farming lands here, in one vast body, thoroughly stocked and on a paying basis. Our markets for the sale of cattle are the City of Mexico and tho United States. At present, while low prices reign at the north, wo ship to the city with best results. A duty of 20 per cent, ad valorem is paid to ship to tho United States on steers only. Here wo own the property wo graze on. There is no purchasing of water holes and then controlling tho surrounding dry country, as in tho states. Your range comprises what you have bought, and no outsiders can trespass on your property. This does away with overstocking and its subsequent losses, so fruitful in tho north. Government titles are, as a rule, now given, as foreigners ouly purchase under that right, even buying from privato parties. The elements of successful cattle raising are found here, i. c., grass, water and shelter, unaccompanied by droughts or blizzards. The fear of the instability of the Mexican government, and the inherent dislike that tho Texan has always held toward tho Mexican, prevented residents of Texas from occupying this country years ago. This is now overcome and a strong tide of emigration has set in. ? Chihuahua Cor. New York World. Mamma-"I told you not to play with that Jones boy, Arthur.'' Arthur?"I wasn't playing with him, many ma; I was just chasing him to give hiwL a licking."?[Life. For the Yorkville Enquirer. I REMINISCENCES OF WESTERN YORK. In 1851 or 1852, Davis Ilurns lived at Mr. Richard Sherer's, near Hlairsville. He was engaged asa farm laborer. Dave, like many others who have preceded him in these reminiscences, had a great deal of self-confidence. There was nothing that anybody else could do but he thought he could do, too. Mr. Sherer had a great many bees. One Sunday the family went to church and left Bill Sherer and Dave at home to watch the bees, with instructions ? that if they swarmed they must settle them and wait for one of the boys (I don't remember which) to come home and hive them. They hadn't been gone long before the bees began to buzz about, and Bill and Dave, with cow bells, plows, clevises and anything that would make a noise, tried to drown the hum and buzz of the hive. They succeeded, however, in quieting the bees, and they settled on the bough of a peach tree, about ten feet from the ground. The swarm was like Charlie Allen's "pone of bread"?it was "a big 'un, and a good 'un, too." ' Nothing would do Dave but ho must - . hive the bees. Bill told him he had better wait. "No," he said, "You help me to get the table and gum to the place ; I'll hive 'em." Bill said: "Dave, you'd better let it alone; them bees will sting you, sure." "No, they won't; I'll smoke 'em." "Very wen,." saia jjiii, -gu aneuu and you'll see." They brought out the table, table-cloth and bee-gum to the place and Dave was going to saw off the limb and brush the bees into the gum. The table was placed under the limb and Dave mounted it and began sawing off the limb. The limb was a heavy one, and it took only a few strokes with thesaw to weaken it. All at once it gave way and down come the whole hive on top of Davis's were of shining gold, morn souls who lived in Walhalla wouldViarcl^^^* out and havea furious battle, but by dinner time their wounds would be healed. They ate bacon and drank beer from the skulls of their enemies. Odin, the terrible God of War, would carouse with the souls in Walhalla. This is the only instance I can remember, in mythology, where Heaven is pictured as a place of fighting and bloodshed. It seems a remarkable fact that, etghteen centuries after Christ was crucified on Calvary, there should be a town built in civiii'/pd and Christianized South Carolina. which should bear the name of a heathen Heaven?and such a singular, warlike Heaven. It shows how people cling to old names. McDonald Form an. How the Farmer's are Taxed.?The Springfield Democrat puts the question of the great issues of the tariff in its broadest and most convincing light when itasksthe farmers, "Do you know where the shoe pinches? For twenty years you have been laboring hard to remove that mortgage upon your farms and it is still un paid. It bids lair to outlive you anu pass ^ as a heritage to your children. Twenty years ago the highest tariff ever known was enacted as a war necessity. It is still in force. Since it was enacted what have you raised or produced as a laborer that has produced any protection? Not a single item. You have held your own or grown poorer. How has it been with what you buy? Highly protected and upon which you have paid 47 percent. To be sure you have not paid that much to the government. It has received only one sixth of the taxes you have paid. The other five-sixths you have paid has gone into the pockets of the trjasts and of those whom the 47 per cent./benefitted, while your farm is still mortgaged and you have just about held your own or grown poorer, Ju paying forty-seven per cent, taxes, on^^^H sixth to the government, which is RfflflflSH than it needs, and the other five-sixtg^^^^H the protective folic a7?. Farmers about tlmMhings at d see fafl H to even Jip matters a head. This sudden change of/josition aroused the bees and they sought revenge for such treatment. Bill had taken the * precaution to gi*e the bees his room around the table, and there was no one to share this apiary indignation with Dave. No longer able to stand the storm, he dismounted from the table and with hat in hand, fighting like a Turk, he made for a clump of bushes from which Bill was looking on. Bill left as Dave advanced. With both hands he knocked east and west while he wa3 literally covered with the bees. As Bill ran, Dave took after him crying at the top of his voice : "Bill Sherer, come and help me to get these bees out of my head." But that was no talk for Bill at that time. He wisely thought prudence the better part of valor and kept his distance. After Dave got rid of the bees he took a fine comb and went to the spring, bathed his head and combed it. He said he combed out fifty stings. His eyes and head were swollen beyond recognition when Mr. Sherer's family returned from church to find themselves minus a swarm of bees. This, so far as I knew, was Dave Burns's first and last experience with bees. While he was engaged at Mr. Sherer's, *' /"1 u.. Hioro nn ? visit Miss isancy *^ru3ujy iaui? mv.v v- ? ..? one day and Dave undertook to show off by kicking one of the dogs, which perhaps thought it was monarch of all it surveyed. The dog didn't approve of this arbitrary conduct and slightly left the impression i1*1 Qfl |)je of f|]p der. It was a long time before Dave hearu the last of that dog story. John, Walker and William, Mr. Richard Sherer's sons, with the Hoods, George M. Hamrick and Plaxico'ssons, composed the Bullock's Creek Band. John P. Hood, Esq., was the leader. Some of the Nelson boys belonged to it, too; but the abovenamed were the band proper. This band played at all the public meetings in Western York when their services were called for?regimental and battalion musters, school exhibitions, Fourth of July celebrations, <tc. They were a fine band and drew a crowd whenever they were called upon to play. We have incidentally made mention of this band, but of the individual members we have said but little yet. Miss Elizabeth Sherer was the belle of the Blairsville section, if not of Western York, in her youthful days. There was a graceful dignity about her person and manners that was truly angelic. That scornful pride and egotism that has wrecked the fortune of many of her sex was conspicuously absent in her case. Unostentatious, she was the embodiment of all the noble attributes that make woman an angel in human form. She, with her sisters and brothers, were members of the Presbyterian church at Bullock's Creek. She married Mr. James Plexico, Sen. Mr. Robert M. Plexico married Miss Martha Sherer, her sister. Than she the world, never produced a better woman. She died several years ago. Of her and other membersof the family, we will have something more to say hereafter. j. l. s. For the Yorkville Enquirer. WALHALLA. Walhalla is the county seat of Oconee county. The land where the town stands was bought in 1800 by the German Colonization Society, and the first building was erected in 1851. Probably few persons in Oconee county know from what the word Walhalla comes. In Scandinavian mythology, Walhalla, or Valhalla, was a palace or hall where the souls of kings and brave men dwelt after death. Ip front of the hall there was a beautiful grove of trees, the leaves of which