Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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% AMFSEMEXTS IX PERSIA. pleasures of rich and poor in AN ORIENTAL COUNTRY Smoking and Drinking?Tea-houses and Public Baths?Professional Story Tellers?Tho "Iiouters." In the way of popular amusements there is not much in Persia, writes Wolf Von Schierbrand in the i-an Fraucisco Chronicle. The rich, of course, as elsewhere, know how to find and sip the honey of amusement from the chalice of life. Xot#o the poor. The wealthy Persian indulges iu banquets, to which he will invite his intimate friends, and where they will get beastly drunk on arrack and wine and date brandy, where from forty to 200 dishes and sweetmeats are served, and where some female slaves wiil dance to him and his guests; where they will recline after the meal by the b /bbliug kanaut, with the fragrant fumes of the ghalyan enveloping them, while Jewish musicians will play and a professional story-teller will get oli his best yarns and jokes, the whole crowd meanwhile swilling tea and sherbet by the galloon. In the evening they will even have fireworks, and hundreds of little lamps, inclosed in varicolored glass globes, which have their rays reflected from the glass ceilings. The rich will go olf on long hunting excursions or on hawking parties, or to pigeon matches. They will employ jugo-w* nnd nrizo-firrhters and magicians. They will while the weary hours pleasantly away in their andarouns with their women in a variety of ways. Money always tinds means to spend the time amusingly, if it chooses, but how about the poor Persians, and they form ninety nine per cent, of the population? Practically they have ouly the ghalzan. the tea-house, the bath, and the professional 6tory-tellers and "boutees'' to give them their foretaste of the paradise which Mohammed has printed in such glowing colors. The ghalzan is the Russian water pipe. It is quite different from , the Turkish narghilen, has no flexible , tube and mouthpiece, but a straight, still stem, and it is so heavy and inconvenient to hold that it requires one's two hands aud entire attention to manipulate it. But the splendid smoke it furnishes compensates for the trouble. The smoke passes through cool water and is quite free from nicotine when it comes to the ' mouth. The tobacco u<ed in the ghalzan is j called "tumbekee," to dis iuguish it < from the "futun," or tobacco or the ] chibouk. It is raised in three grades. In the lower grades of tumb.kee some opium is admixed, and this with the "inveterate smoker produces along in the afternoon a sort of narcosis, called by . them "keif;"' that is. the state of greatest . attainable well being, of tranquillity ' (the Persian has the same word for b.iss, joy, happiness and tranquillity). Many Persians will smoke fo:ty to fifty ghalzans a dav; that is, they will generally only suv ke up half the t bacco in the silver cup that holds it on top of the bottle shaped ghalzans, throwing the other hall way as it is usually impiegnated with nicotine. These pipes arc kept . exceedingly clean, a remarkable fact in a country wh^e-e^en the highest arc quitedilthyto'our'notibn. In the house- c. holds of the well-to do one of the high- c est servants is the ghal/.andar (pipe- ? bearer), whose exclusive duty it is to ^ clean the pipes and keep his master sup- ? plied with fresh ones. The ladies, too, 1 smoke the ghalzan a great deal, both ? those of high and low rank. I have seen ladies from the Shah's audnroun ? stop on the high road in their carriages j, by a wayside inn and have half a dozen ghalzans brought to them, the eunuchs * and servants meanwhile blocking the way to all passers-by. The teahouse is the Persian substitute ? for our great American saloou. Curiously enough, although nothing but tea and j. sherbet is ever called for iu these places a in the way of liquids, they are termed t gahway khane (.coffee house) in Persian. t Every large town in Persia has hundreds , such places. In Teheran there are between J 400 and-500 of them, some of them quite t elegant and high-toued, but they are cheap, all of them. There is generally a c large, high room, through the middle of t which a stream is rushing, in summer, ^ with a species of summer garden behind, r where the nightingales are performing and the roses are blushing in their native * ftink. Dozens of Persians of high aud j ow degree are seated on their haunches rj by tie babbling water, smoking incessant a ghalzans and driukmg tea sweet and hot, . while a story teller unfolds before their ~c half-closed eyes all the splendors of bus- j turn ana tne t'ersia ot oia. 10 su mere c a couple of hours enjoying himself c hugely, while & son or nephew is left in j charge of the shop in the neighboring s bazar, will cost no more than 5 to 15 ( Bhahi (3i to 10 cents). Of late, however, , the tea-house business had become so r much in vogue all over Persia, and the ^ artisans, mechanics and small merchants ( had become so addicted to the habit of ( resorting there, that the Shah issued a j firman to close up or pull down all the ( tea-houses in Persia. Of course, like all these firmans, it was not carried out, al- < though thousands of the smaller ones j were razed to the ground. The Lil-es- j Sultan and Ispahan, for instance, had 5 about 200 destroyed, But that left sev cral hundred yet. and the remaining t ones of course did a more flourishing , business than ever. The public baths are another source of Pleasure to the lower class of Persians, hey are nearly, if not quite, as numerous as the tea-houses. The big majority of them are 'very meanly built of sunbake:! mud bricks, and so carelessly constructed that a roof of one fell in while I < -was in Teheran. The towels uaed in ] lwthp f-.nstomers nialnanrl fprnalf* , are never washed, but only dried in the i sun, hung up on strings along the wall < facing tbic street. \ The price of a bath is generally be- * tween two cents and ten cents, which sum include? the services of the "hammaindjees" (servants and professional kneaders in the bathk These are common tanks filled with hot water, in which the first ablutions are performed. 'I he , water in these tanks, although often serving for 200 or oOJ persons a day, is changed about twice a week, seldom 1 oftener, so there is not much fun about 1 1 bathing in there. But the fun begins - when the hither emerges from the tank, when he or she is kneaded, combed. I anointed, dyed, etc., thc-e offices being I performed for the men by thehammamd jcc and for the women reciprocal 1 y. Tho women resort much more to the baths than the men, not because they are eleauer, but because the Koran obliges thein to, and because the bath is the great place for gossip, the focus whence all the scandal-monging, all the idle tales and all the backbiting, of which Pcrisinn women are so fond, radiates. The story-teller is another great Persian institution. The Persian is by nature and inclination a story-teller, and here you will still find the gift of charming r,c tal, of graceful, animate gesture, of well-modulated voice, such as you will search in vain lor eisewnerc. cm a puolic square, on the ruins of some deserted house, on the steps of a lnr^e mosque, the story-teller will plant himself and begin, with sonorous voice and sweeping arms, a tale from the Arabian Nights, from Persia's legendary history, from the great national poets, or he will recite, in a voice vibrating with tho emotions he speaks of. pa-.'C after pago from Hafiz, Saadi, or Djellal-Eddin Humme. He wil| do this in such a way as to intensely interest his audience, quickly formed, so that they are as much,excited ana interested as the Sultan was in Scheherazade's tales, when he, like her, breaks oil the thread, to be taken up after the collection his assistants make with the "kaeshkhull" (hollowed cocoanut) has yielded what he deems his due. Some of these'fellows, haggard, ragged, their cheeks hollowed by too much "bheng" (hashe.-sh smoking),are natural poets, men of gifts, but there -is no other channel for them to get rid of the divine afflatus. for modern poetry is despised in Persia, and the poet of the present is even worse off in Pers'a to-day than in the days of Hafiz, who was also often near starvation point. The "louters" are a peculiar fcind of people, always in alliance and on terms of intimacy with the story-tellers. They are jugglers, 6leight-of-hand performers, clowns, prize lighters,etc., are very quarrelsome, are nearly all uubelievers and atheists, and hail generally from Shirar, Farsistan and the whole south of Persia. They are tramps, never marry, let their hair rrow.ca-rv alwavs the "khandshar'' o - - ^ ^ _ ^ (curved dagger, eighteen inches longt m their "kamerbund" (belt) and are quick to take ofTense and fight. They arc always up to mischief, secretly excite revolts and big fiirhts, and are in for anything winch will give them a chance to spill blood. From their ranks generally the professional robbers and thieves graduate, and their strolling life makes it difficult for the authorities to keep track of them or arrest them when they lave done some big deed of darkness. Irrigation in Japan. In all parts of the mountains and in the j roothills. at the sources and along ihe ine of the streams, there arc immense eservoirs for the storage of water in the ainy season. By this means the overlow of the lower lands in the wet months s to some extent prevented, and the ;upply iu the dry mouths is supplementid. The ditches for irrigation are alvays so constructed as to be a means of Irainage when there is an excess of rain. iy this means the supply of water to the armer is equalized through the whole ear. Another necessary rc-ult is aclomplished ?the health of the irrigated listricts for plants and people is conerved. Draiuage for these purposes is ust as imnortant in any country as irrigation. The Japanese system is perfect n three important particulars, viz., toragc of water, distribution of water o the land, and tbc drainage of the irrigated lands. That irrigation has been >roved there to be of incalculable bencit is shown by the enormous crop rate hrough the wh^le Empire. It is within >ounds to say that a .Japanese farmer aises more from one acre of his land I han a California farmer does from five ,cres. It is true that much of the land there tas two crops a year?one iu the summer nd one in winter. In many places in hat island empire the soil has yielded wo crops a year for 2,000 years, and the >roductive capacity of the soil is greater low than ever. That is in marked conrast to the result of land skinning in he United States. In the spring apiece if land will be sown to rice, which is he great staple crop. The rice is har csted in October, with an average crop ate of fifty bushels to the acre: and ight on the hre's of the reaper follows he spade and mattock, preparing the and for n crop of wheat, barley or rye. rhese latter crops are sown in October ind November and are harvested in Vpril or May, with an average crop rate >f forty bushels of barley to the acre, n order to maintain through hundreds >f years such a crop rate, fertili/at'on is >f the utmost importance. In fact that s the great problem for the farmer to iolve. Unlike this and European counties, the farmer has no barnyard fertili:ers. The people eat neither beef, pork, nutton, butter, milk nor cheese. Catle and horses arc used only for purposes >f packing. "With a population of 3^.)00,000, there are less than 1,000.000 lead of horses and 1,00'*, 000 head of mttle. and no sheep or swine. Under these circumstances the question if fcriili-ers is of the first importance: experience has taught these people that rrigation is an important means ol lertilt'.ation. It has been demonstrated tliat rrigatcd lands require only about two :hird* as much fertilization as non-ir igated lands. As an evidence of what horough tillage, combined with irriga;ion 'and drainage, has done there, it iceds only to be stated that Japan has jnder tillage only 1*2.0:10.000 acres; that rom these 12.000,000 acres 3^.000.000 people are clothed and fed. More than :hat is done; -10,000,000 pounds of tea, dlk to the value of several million dolars. and large quantities of tobacco and ice are annually exported. Such results Bpealc more than volumes or what thor>ugh tillage, supplemented by irriga:ion. can do even in a country with sixty r> 10ft inrtioe nf rninfnll ?Sail Jfmni'i.int Chroniole. A Little Mixed. A young man was to speak to the toast, "The Ladies." He got the lines of Popo on vice mixed with those of Scott 011 woman, and delivered himself as follows: "I rise to say that I have no doubt but that I voice the sentiment of every gentleman here when I say, in the familiar lines: '"Oh, woman, in our kour3 of ease, Uncertain, coy, and hard to please; Hut seen too oft, familiar with thy face, Wo tirst endure, then pity, then embrace.'* SCIENTIFIC ANI) INDUSTRIAL. A California electrician has invented a process whereby gold, silver, and copper can be instantly smelted by a lightning stroke. It is now claimed that one of the results of the recent earthquake is the diminution of the flow of natural gas from certain wells, and a considerable feeling of anxiety is consequently per vading the circles lutercstea. The project of a South Polar expedition is being seriously ventilated in the scientific circles of Australia, the Goverunu nt having expressed its intention of assisting the enterprise. The Australian whalemen arc also becoming interested in th project, inquir es having already reached London whether whaling vessels for an anti-Arctic voyage would be subsidized by the Government. Paper doors co t about the same as wood, and are said to be much better, because there is no shrinking, swelling, or warping. The paper door is composed of two thick paper boards stamped and molded into panels, and glazed together with glue and potash, and then rolled through heavy rollers. It i3 first covered with a waterproof coating, and then with a fireproof coating, and is painted and varnished and hung in the ordinary way. It is said that the great glazier of Alaska is moving at the rate of a quarter of a mile per annum toward the sea. The front presents a wall of ice somefivo hundred feet in thickness; its breadth varies from three to ten miles, and it is ab ut 150 miles long. Almost every (jUarter of an hour hundreds of tons of ice in large blocks fall into the sea, which they agitate in the most violent manner the waves bcinrr such as to toss about the largest vessels that approach j the glacier as if they were small boats. ' Even sea-weed has a certain value, and some day may be in considerable demand. A new English method of utilizing it consists in boiling it with carbonate of soda, filtering and treating with sulphuric acid. Thus is obtained a substance to be known as ''alguina," which has more viscosity than starch, or even gumnrabic, and may be profitably used in stitfening textile fabrics. It is said to be also adapted for the making of syrups and foff culinary purposes. From the matter left after extracting this substance a very good writing paper may be cheaply made. The duration of the infectious stages of various diseases is thus given by Dr. J. F. Pearsc, an English physician: Measles, from the second day of the disease, for three weeks; small-pox, from the fourth day, for four weeks; scarlet fever, from the fourth day, for seven weeks; mumps, from the second day, for I'ool-c /iinVif Viorin -from thn first till CU ~ ?.? . day, for three -weeks. The incubation periods, or intervals occurring between exposure to infection and the first symptoms. are as follows: Whooping-cough, fourteen days; mumps, eighteen days; measles, ten days; small-pox, twelve days; scarlet fever, three days; diphtheria, fourteen days. HEALTH* HINTS. Drinking a cupful of southernwood tea will often cure a headache. Frosted feet are said to be cured by holding them in the smoke made by j sprinkling corn meal on live coals: best | to have it under cover, so as to get the ! full benefit of the smoke. In case of sickness a call for old linen docs not mean worn-out shirt bosoms (as many seem to think), but soft pieces of handkerchiefs, napkins and tablecloths; or even old cotton goods.if very fine and soft. All such pieces should be saved; if you have more than you want give part to some one less fortunate than yourself. The best plaster for a quick restorativo is to take a six-inch square of common adhesive plaster and sprinkle it over with cayenne pepper. It does not adhere to the underclothing, as the plasters that are made up with pitch are sure to do, and it 4 sticks" fast enough for as long ~-aani?.n/l Tim vhIIaw orlhociun i US IS JUljUJICVA. A 14V/ HV4i?vv?.w plaster can be purchased in long strips very chqjply. If will lie welcome new3, if true, to many suilercrs, that chronic diarrhoea ! may bo cured, or at any rate greatly al- j leviatcd, by the administration of a sa uratcd solution of salt and cider vinegar, the dose being a dram three or four times a da}'. Dr. T. C. Smith, who recommends it in the Me Hod and, Surgical Journal, cured a case which had lasted 1 nearly forty years, and has employed it with great success in numerous other instances. "When relapse followed the suspension of the remedy, its renewed administration was again followed by improvement. The Stores of Paris. . Paris beautifies herself as much for the rest of the world as for her own people. She lives off her visitors, and her store windows are put up to catch nocoor.htr T'hAQA rrrAftf. ! IUV7 CJO "1 I boulevards are lined with stores which . at night are illuminated brilliantly, both outside and in. Lines of gas-jets with ' relators are placed above the windows on the outside so that they may cast a strong bla'O down upon the goods displayed. ^Nearly all the goods of the store, as a rule, are in the windows, and the interior is not to be entered except for purchase. Small stocks are carried, I judge, and as a general thing a firstclass Paris store is not inorc than twelve -** ? "? T avnf leui. square vu m?j jusiuc. i v> . cour.-e, the grand establishments of the "Aiagazin du Louvre," and the "Hon Marche." Your average Parisian merchant begins business at about 8 and closes at about 'J in the evening. At noon he takes a recess for two hours for his breakfast, and between 1 and 2 little business is done nil over the city. The man and his wife, as a rule, work together, and the wife here is the better half in n business way. It is she who keeps the cash account, and the books of Paris maybe said to be kept by women. There are no smarter women in the world than these Parisicnnes. They are not beautiful, but they are intensely practical, and they make excellent wives and good mothers. The love for family is strong in France, general reports to the contrary notwithstanding, and no nation has more loving fathers and doting mothers than this,?Paris Letter. A Reminiscence of Lincoln's Assassination. Thomas F. Pendel, who has served twenty-three years as a guard at the White House, has been talking to a Philadelphia Press reporter about his life in the F.xccvtive Mansion. speaking cf President Lincoln's assassination, "Mr. Pendel said : "Un one dark rainy day the President and myself walked ovi-r to Secretary Stanton's office in the War Dcpa tmcnt. He and Mr. Lincoln held a conference and then we started again. On the stairway of the department we met a stranger, who looked at the I'resident and he looked'at him. I watched them both intently. The man passed on his way up stairs and the President kept going down, but .Mr. Lincoln kept his eyes on him. "When the stranger reached the head of the stairs ho turned and peered over the balustrade,and when he reached the pavement the President spoke for the first time. 'Peridclton,' ho said, 'I received a letter from New York yesterday telling me that a man answering his descripton and dressed just like him was on his way to Washington to kill me.' ' Then came that terrible night. Mr. Ashmer, of New York; Mr. Colfax, Speaker of the House, and Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln, were chatting in the parlor before smarting for the theatre. Kichmond had fallen and the house was illuminated. Do you know the reason the President went to the theatre that night? It had been advertised that Grant would be there, bnfe 'he couldn't, and Mr. Lincoln went so that the people would not be disappointed. I saw the party off, and sent a guard to look after them. About nine o'clock the bell rang, and when I answered it a man said: 'Do you know they have tried to cut Secxetnry Seward's throat?' I said: 'Xo, it can't be.' A few moments later he returned,breathless, and exclaimed: 'Yes, it is so. The cavalry arc up and down the avenue.' Then I grew uneasy about the President, and sent out messengers. A few minutes afterward I saw Senator Sumner coming up the hill, followed by a crowd of men and boys, and he gasped: 'How about the President?' He had hardly finished talking when Commissioner iSewlin arrived and said: 'The President has been shot through the back of the head.' I went to Captain Lincoln's room. He had just returned from the front, and I said: 'Captain, something has happened to the President.' I told the Military Secretary plainly what it was. fie turned white as death and said: 'Don't let any one come in the house.' I was going down stairs when little Tad, who had been to the National Theatre, rushed into my arms and cobbed: 'Uh, Tom Pen, somebody ha3 killed my papa to-day.' It was an awful night. " I rushed through crowds on the streets to Petersi.Ys tailor's store, where the President had been taken, passed the line of guards, and Mrs. Lincoln met me in one of the pirlors with hair disheveled and almost wild. 'Oh, Pendleton,' she cried, 'if you had been here it would not have happened.' " Can Imagination Kill ? In discussing the death of a young woman at Hackney, England; under cir cumstancca in which a certain insect powder largely figured, the London Lancet says: As the powder appears, by Dr. Tidy's experiment, to be perfectly harmless, the suggestion is not unnaturally made that the deceased, who' was possibly of an hysterical, highly-imaginative turn of mind, took the powder in the full belief that by its means her death might be accomplished. The writer of the article in our contemporary, we think wrongly, brings forward two remarkable instances i of what may be regarded as practical < jokes with melancholy terminations. In i the case of the convict delivered up to the scientist, for the purpose of a psy- , chologital experiment (the man was strap- j ped to a table and blindfolded, "ostensibly , to be bled to death; a siphon contain- , iog water was placed near his head \ and the fluid was allowed to trickle au- ; dibly into the vessel below it.at the same ; time that a trifling scratch with a needle \ was inflicted on the culprit's neck; it is ; said that death occurred at the end of six minutes) fear must have played no inconsiderable share in the fatal result, and we do not know whether all the vital organs were in a sound condition, though they wcrepressumably so. The old story of the case of a college porter is also one in p >int. The students entrapped him into a room at night, a mock inquiry was held, and the punishment of death by decapitation decreed for his want of consideration to the students. It is a small wonder that, under the dominion of fear and belief in the earnestness of his tormentors, the s<gnof an ax and block, with sub-equent blindfolding and necessary genutlexation, a smart rap with a wet towel on the back of bis neck should have been followed by the picking up of a corpse. Squirrel Pie. Three young men 01 t hane ton, .Mo , v killed twelve dozen squirrels in one day. ( A large gray squirrel was raptured t wliilc swimming across the Patuxent f river in Maryland. This is said to be the 8 first s juirrel ever seen swimming across a 8 broad body of wa cr. ' * A trackman on the Grand Trunk rail- a way says an immense dro ve of squirrels c cro-sed the tracks at Petrolia, C'a ada, 8 completely blocking them. A hand-cat ? which ran into the drove killed sixty- * four. 81 Richad Chancy, Of Denton, Md., shat a squirrel in the woods and threw it across h s shoulder. Samuel Anderson, another sportsman, approached Chancy frombdiind, ar.d, seeing the squirrel's t] bushy tail, thought the animal was sit- < ting on a stump. He fired his gun and p shot Chaney in the neck. 5 A pet squ;rrel was taken sick and its i< teelh grew so long that it could not h gnaw. It was taken to a dentist, who 4 ground the teeth down to their proper a length. During the operation the squiri fi rel kicked like a mule, and its shrieks 0 caused people to run up the street io find V out what was the matter. fi A 4- ol it* Cl.-ronfnn .vo'lrt 11 A JJUia^JUU.wi m tjuuiiiwii, ?iiAtatea a nut-scller by stealing nuts from cl his stand at every opportunity. After a-' the thieving had continued a number of tc days the victim compl. incd to the squir- h rel's master. It was then discovered " that the little thief had stored fourteen u quarts of nuts in its master's cellar. The is nuts were returned to their owner and oi the squirrel was put in close confinement. i WORKING A CEDAR MINE. RECOVERING SUBMERGED TREES FROM ANEW JER8EX SWAMP. A Forest of Biff Cedars That Fell Ages Ago?Methods ot Their Recovery?Their Uses. A Dennisville (N. J.) letter to the New York Sun says: The fallen and submerged cedar forests of this part of New Jersey, which were discovered first beneath the Dennisville swamps seventyfive years ago, still afford employment to scores of people in their excavation, and arc a source of constant interest to geol ogists. There arc standing at the present day no such immense specimens of the cedar anywhere in the country as are found embedded deep in the muck of the Dennisville swamps. Some of the trees that have been uncovered are six feet in diameter, and trees four feet through are common. Although ages must have passed t since these great forests fell and be- J came covered many feet beneath the surface, such trees as fell, according to the general theory, while yet living trees, are as sound to-day as they were the day they were uprooted. These trees arc called windfalls, as it is thought they were torn up by the roots during some terrible gale of an unknown past. Others are found in the muck which are called break-downs, as they were evidently dead trees when they fell, and have been held by the action of the mud and water in the swamp in the same stage of decay they were in when they fell. The cedar forests, it is thought, grew in a fresh-water lake or swamp, the action of which was necessary to their existence. According to Mr. Clarence Deming and Dr. Maurice Beasely, eminent geological authorities of southern New Jersey, the sea cither broke in on the swamps or the land subsided, and the salt water reached the trees. This destroyed the life of many of them, and in time the great windfall came and leve'ed the forest. The trees now lie beneath the soft soil at various depths, and ever since 1812 the logs have been mined and are an important factor in the local commercial interests of South Jersey. The cedars are cut up into shingles and staves, and the longevity of articles made from tne wood is shown in shingles, tubs, and pails which were made over seventy years ago, and which show no signs of decay yet. The working of a "cedar mine" is exceedingly simple. The log digger enters the swamp and prods in the soft soil with a long, sharp iron rod. The trees lie so thickly beneath the surface that the rod cannot be pushed far into the muck before it strikes a log. That done, the miner soon informs himself as to the length of the trunk, and then chips *ofI a piece which his rod brings up. By the smell of this chip the logger can tell whether he has struck a break-down or a windfall, and, if it is the latter, he proceeds at once to raise the log. He works a saw similar to those used by ice cutters, down through the mud and saws the log in two as near the roots as necessary. The top is next sawed olf, and then the big cedar stick is ready to be released from its resting plac \ A ditch A A -x _ xL. 1 xl 2. 1_ 13 uug uown 10 me lug, uie 'iruuh. 13 loosened, and it rises up with the water to the surface of the ditch. A curious thing is noticed about these logs when they come to the surface, and that is that they invariably turn over with their bottom sides up. The log is sawed into proper lengths for shingles or staves, which are split and worked into shape entirely by hand. These cedar shingles command a price,much higher than pine or chestnut shingles. These ancient cedars are of the white variety, and have the same strong, aromatic fragrance when cut that the common red cedar has. The wood is of a delicate flesh color. One of the mysteries : is that none of the trees is ever found to be water-logged in tne slightest degree, [t is impossible to tell how many layers ! deep these cedars lie in tho swamp, but it ;is certain that there are several layers, ?d that with all the work that has been J done in the swamp for seventy years the Sr.st layer has not yet been removed. At 1 some places in the marsh the soil has sunk for several feet and become dry, ] md there the fallen cedars may b; seen 1 lying one on top of another in great beans. No tree has been removed from ' the Dcnnisvillc swamp from a greater 1 lepth than three feet, but they have I been found at a greater depth outside ' the limits.of the swamp, showing not * >nly the correctness of the depp-laycr * theory, but the great extent of the ancient ' Forest outside, of the swamp arear Near ;hc shores of the Delawaro, nearly eight niles from Dennisville, white cedar logs lave been exhumed from a depth of .wolve feet. At ('ape May, twenty miles j listant,drillers of an artesian well struck , >ne of the trec3 when the drill was almost linety feet in the earth, it was lying in ] in alluvial deposit similar to the Dcnnis'ille marsh. Another log was found at 1 Japa .May twenty feet below the sur- . ace, and a third at a depth of seventy eet. These logs were nil of enormous ] i/.c. What it is in the amber-colored wamp*water and red muck at Dennis- ' ille that preserves theso trees so that , iter a lapse of centuries their fiber is as lean aud smooth as it was when the 1 rcen branches of the cedars were waving . vcr the swamp is a mystery that scien- * ifie men have as yet been unable to n olvd. 1 Origin of "Boots aud Saddles." -j Three or fcur years ago I accidentally ^ ;arned while at some French manoeuvres hat the cavalry trumpet sound called / 'boots and saddles" had not, as was suposed any connection whatever with ^ oots. The true origin of the sentence ^ j the old Norman expression, " oute# i telle'1 (i. tf.,t"put on tne saaaic"), trom x Bouter"?to put on, affix. Equally by coident, at the German ninncruvrcs "just ? ni-hed I have ascertained the origin of j ur word of command, "double march." i'e have iu military matters copied much T *om the Germans, especially during the fe of Frederick the Great, toward the 11 lose of whose reign our drill b;gan to ^ jsume substance and uniformity. Well. ) this day, when a German officer wishes It is men to proceed at a run he calls out: _ .Marsch, m irsch!" the two words bei'icr ttered quickly. Thus, "Double march" \ i a most literal translation of au oldjtablished German word of command. -London Times. 1 fl5 NoV. JMbl SELECT SIFTINGS! British scientists say they have found proofs in "Welsh caves that men existed 240,000 years ago. It is affirmed that more than $60,000 worth of coal is stolen from coal trains in this country annually. If the Chinese nation were to pass before an observer in single file, the procession would never cease, for anewgenearation would be coming on the stage as fast as the procession moved. T?/?ir T? n n n ttt n Ti i n r*Vi n m r\ f Tl flflf nl iigv* jl aiicua t? k, jL/iu^uam, vi jjiiovvi, England, has in his possession a watch made in 1595, and said to be the first watch made in England. It once belonged to Queen Elizabeth, and has onlyone hand. The Romans had a class of educated ' slaves, who were employed by their masters in different occupations requiring a certain amount of literary acquirements and skill, such as transcribing and binding books, writing letters and acting as . librarians. Many people are probably not aware of the fact tnat New York had an Iri*h Catholic Governor in 1683, and for some years after. This was Thomas Dongan, the younger son of Sir John Dongan, an Irish Baronet, and a nephew to Richard Talbott, Earl of Tyrconnel. A curious export of New Zealand is a peculiar fungus which grows on the trees in some sections, and which is sold only in China, where the demand is rapidly increasing. Its uses do not seem to be well understood, but English officials have reported that it is employed as a blood-purifying medicine, as food in soups, and as a dye. During the civil war 212,003 Union soldiers were < aptured by the Confederates, and the Northerners captured 4SG,169 Confederates. The number of Union troops who died while prisoners was 29,725, or a little more than one in seven of all captured. The number of Confederates who died while prisoners was 26,784, or very nearly one in eigh-'^^H teen. ^ The Pennsylvania Railroad is owned by 19,340 shareholders in lot3 of from ; one fifty-dollar share up. The New York Central Railroad is owned by 10,818 shareholders, of whom about one-third a. -e a are women or executors 01 estates, ine Merrimac Manufacturing Company (cotton) of Lowell is owned by 2,500 shareholders, of whom forty-two per cent, are holders of one share, twenty-one per cent, of two, and ten per cent, of three shares. Twenty-seven per cent, are holders of over three shares, and not less than thirty-eight per cent, of the whole stock is held by trustees, guardians and executors of charitable, religious, educational and financial institutions. Iudians Receiving Government Rations. Writing about the issuance of government rations to the Cheyenne Indians, _ ri! /?\-l a.-, v Wli. a! Ci T)?..1 a rierre ^uaiioiu; letter to tue st. xraut Pioneer Frets says: During the slaughtering the bucks and squaws hang about the house, watching eagerly for the first sign of the bones and oilal to be thrown out. "When this is done the bucks seize it, and cracking the bones with their little tomahawks, devour the raw marrow, a great dainty with them. The squaw3 pick up and carry away any bit of refuse meat which may be thrown out, ;the whole to enter into the composition of somo mysterious compound unknown by any civilized nation of the globe. I very soon had enough of the sights at the slaughter pens and strolled up to the agent's office. Instead of the ideal of my early days, I found a lazy set of dirty Indians, wrapped in great blankets, faces painted in all colors of the rainbow, squatting around on the ground, waiting for the wakapominee or issue from the government. The squaws were dressed in garments made in a style never before seen, and perhaps never to be seen again. A straight l>ng, a hole cut in one end for the head to pass through, while the sleeves are Btiched to the corners of the bag, forms the wearing apparel of the dusky maidens of the Sioux nation. Around the wrists are coils of brass wire, while dependant from the cars are huge bunches of shells and quills. Around the waist a leathern belt, thickly studded with brass-headed tacks, and you have the tout ensemble of a Sioux squaw, whether young or ola. i lie issue being completed ind tlie rations stowed away, the entire bribe "folded their tents and silently itole away to the camps amomg the dills. Kales for Society. 5fou ask me for rules of society, The following were given to me. Alas! though they sound pretty simple, I fail in each one of the three, rhe first is the shortest, but hardest: Forget yourself? dress, looks and all, Sot wishing you re stouter or thinner, Less dark, or less fair, or less tall: Forget, though your dress may be shabby; Forget, too, the go of your hair; Forgetting, in short, all about you, Remember all'else who are there. Elule two is: Think always of others, And when you are thinking be sure Co try and discover their be.it points. Dou't dwell on the faults they should cure 1 only you look and endeavor You always may find something good, rhe most disagreeable is never Too utterly horrid and rude. Remember this one has had trouble, That other one may have feeble health, Puis man has been soured by poverty, Another no less so by wealth, rhoso two are just the exceptions, For out of the people you meet i oivll find only one who is sour In proportion to ten who are sweet, 'hink always the best things about them, It will not be hard if you try? knd then you can alway say truly "In this tkin$ he's better than L:l 'he third rule is: Make them all happy; Look around to see who is left out; 'hoer up the shy girl in the corner, AiiiUMJ me oia man wuu iuo gout, ake care of that pale-looking lady, And mind that she's not in the draught, ut don't let her see what you're doing, If needs be, with love mix some craft, alk politics now to the statesman, Converse with another on trade, alk of home and friends to the lonely boy, And of flowers and woods to the maid. ' ever you talk of people, Remember the rule says: ''All," UU ) UU U1U3U UUl/ UU CUbCl LUlUiU? UiiO At the cost of another's fall, s your mission to make all happy, And never to drop a speerli hat could carry sorrow to any heart Wherever your word3 might reach, fter all it's the Bible maxim That puts it shortest and best: Be kind, be courteous, be full of love"? You may safely leave the rest ?New York Observer?