The Manning times. (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, May 24, 1899, Image 4
DARKNESS ETERNAL
What the Earth Would Be Without
the Gospel.
ATHEISM VS. CHRISTIANITY
Rev. Dr. Talmage Vividly Por
trays The Gioom of an Infidel
World. Triumph of Atheism
Would Mean Death to
Civilization.
In this sermon Dr. Talmage gives a
glimps6 of what the world would be if
the gospel were abolished and the hu
man race left without divine guidance.
The text is Acts ii, -0, "The sun shall
be turned into darkncss.
Christianity is the risiog sun of our
time, and men have tried with the up
rolling vapors of skepticism aLd the
smoke of their blasphemy to turn the
sun into darkness. Suppose the arch
angels of malice and horror should be
let loose a little while and be allowed to
extinguish and destroy the sun in the
natural heavens! They would take the
oceans from other worlds and pour them
on the luminary of the planetary sys
tem, and the waters go hissing down
amid the ravines and the caverns. and
there is explosion after explosion. until
there are only a few peaks of tire left
in the sun, and these are cooling down
and going out until the vast continents
of flame are reduced to a small acreage
of fire, and that whitens and cools off
until there are only a few coals left,
and these are whitening and going out
until there is not a spark left in all the
mountains of ashes and the valleys of
ashes and the chasms of ashes. An
extinguished sun! A dead sun! A
buried sun! Let all worlds wail at the
stupendous obsequies.
Of course this withdrawal of the solar
light and heat throws our earth into a
universal chill, and the tropics become
the temperate, and the temperate be
comes the arctic, and there are frozen
rivers and frozen lakes and frozen
oceans. From arctic and antarctic re
gions the inhabitants gather in toward
the center and find the equator as the
poles. The slain forests are piled up
into a great bonfire, and around them
gather the shivering villhges and cities.
The wealth of the coal mines is hastily
poured into the furnaces and stirred
into rage of combustion, but soon the
bonfires begin to lower, and the fur
naces begin to go out, and the nations
begin to die. Cotopaxi, A-esuvius, Et
na, Stromboli, California geysers, cease
to smoke, and the ice of hailstorms re
main unmelted in their crater. All the
flowers have breathed their last breath.
Ships with sailors frozen at the mast,
and helmsmen frozen at the wheel, and
passengers frozen in the cabin, all na
tions dying; first at the north and then
at the south. Child frosted and dead
in the cradle. Octogenarian frosted
and dead at the hearth. Workmen
with frozen hand on the hammer and
frozen foot on the shuttle. Winter
from sea to sea. All congealing winter.
Perpetual winter. Globe of frigidity.
Hemisphere shackled to hemisphere by
chains of ice. Universal Nova Zembla.
The earth an ice floe grinding against
other ice floes. The archangels of ma
lice and horror have done their work,
and now they may take their thrones of
glacier and look down upon the ruin
they have wrought. What the destruc
tion of the sun in the natural heavens
would be to our physical earth, the de
struction of Cnristianity would be to
the moral world. The sun turned into
darkness!
Infidelity in our time is considered a
-eat joke. There are people who re
joice to hear Christianity caricatured
and to hear Christ assailed with quib
ble and quirk and misrepresentation
and badinage and harlequinade. I pro
pose today to take infidelity and athe
ism out of the realm of jocularity into
one of tragedy and show you whyt infi
dels propose and what if they are suc
cessful they will accomplish. There
are those in all our communities who
would like to see the Christian religion
overthrown and who say the world
,vould be better without it.. I want to
show you what is the end of this road
and what is the terminus of this cru
sade and what thig world will be when
atheism and infidelity have triumphed
over it, ifrthey can. I say, if they can.
I reiterate it, if they can.
In the first place, it will be the com
plete and unutterable degradatiou of
womanhood. I will prove it by facts
and arguments which no honest man
will dispute. In all communities and
cities and states and nations where the
Christian religion has been dominant
woman's condition has been ameliorated
and improved, and she is deferred to
and honored in a thusand things, and
every gentleman takes off his hat be
fore her. If your associations have
been good, you know that the name of
wife, mother, daughter, suggests gra
cious surroundings. You know there
are no better schools and seminaries in
this country than the schools and sem
inaries for our young ladies. You know
that while woman may suffer injustice
in England and the United States she
has more of her rights in Christendom
than she has anywhere else.
Now, compare this-with woman's
condition in lands where Christianity
has made little orno advance-in China.
in Barbary, in Borneo, in Tartary, in
Egypt, in Hindustan. The Burmese
sell their wives and danghters as so
many sheep. The Hindoo Bible makes
it disgraceful and an outrage for a wo
man to listen to music or look out of
the window in the absence of her hus
band and gives as a lawful ground for
divorce a woman's beginning to eat be
fore her husband has finished his meal.
What mean those white bundles on the
ponds and rivers in China in the morn
ing? Infanticide following infanticide.
Female children destroyed simply be
cause they are female. Woman har
nessed to the plow as an ox. Woman
veiled and barricaded and in all styles
of cruel seclusion. Her brith a misfor
tune. Her life a torture. Her death
a horror. The missionary of the cross
today in heathen lands preaches gener
-~ ally to two groups-a group of men who
Sdo as they please aad sit where they
Splease; the other group, women hidden
Sand carefully secluded in a side apart
Sment, where they may hear the voice of
Sh e preacher, but may not be seen. No
refinement. No liberty. No hope for
this life. No hope for the life to come.
Ringed nose. Cramped foot. Disfigured
face. Embruted soul. Now, compare
those two conditions. How far toward
this latter condition that I speak of
would woman go if Christian influences
were withdrawn and Christianity were
destroyed? It is only a question of
dynamics. If an object be lifted to a
certain point and not fastened there and
the lifting power be withdrawn, how
long before that object will fall down
to the point from which it started? It
will fall down, and it will go still farther
hritian!. has lin1ed woman up frdin
the ery depths i degradation almost
to t is. If that lifting power be
withdrawn, she falls clear back to the
depth from which she was ressurrected,
not going any lower, because there is no
loser depth. And yet, notwithstand
ing the fact that the only salvation of
woman from degradation and woe is the
Christian religion-and the only influ
ence that has ever lifted her in the so
cial scales is Christianity-I have read
that there are women who reject Chris
tianity. I make no remark in regard to
those persons. In the silence of your
own soul make your observations.
If infidelity triumph and Christiani
tv be overthrown, it means the demor
a lization of society. The one idea in
the Bible that atheists and infidels
imost ha t, is the idea of retribution.
Take away the idea of retribution and
puni4hment from society. and it will
begin very soon to disintegrate, and
take away from the minds of men the
fear of hell, and there are a great many
of them who would very soon turn this
world into a hell. The majority of
tho-e who are indignant against the
Bible because of the idea of punish
ment are men whose lives are bad o:
whose hearts are impure and who hate
the Bible because of the idea of future
punishment for the same reason that
criminals hate the penitentiary. Oh,
I have heard this brave talk about peo
ple fearing nothing of the consequences
of sin in the next world, and I have
made up my mind it is merely a cow
ard's whistling to keep his courage up.
I I have seen men flaunt their immorali
ties in the face of the community, and
I have heard them defy the judgment
day and scoff at the idea of any future
consequence of their sin, but
when they came to die they
shrieked until you could hear them for
nearly two blocks, and in the summer
night the neighbors got up to put the
windows down because they could not
endure the horror.
I would not want to see a rail train
with 500 Christian people on board go
down through a drawbridge into a wat
ery grave; I would not want to see 500
Christian people go intn such disaster,
but I tell you plainly that I could more
easily see that than I could? for any pro
tracted time stand and see an infidel
die, though nis pillow were of eider
down and under a canopy of vermilion.
I havo never been able to brace up my
nerves for such a spectacle. There is
something at such a time eo indescrib
able in the countenance. I just looked
in upon it for a minute or two, but the
clutch of his fist was so diabolic and
the strength of his voice was so unnatu
ral I could not endure it. "There is no
hell, there is no hell, there is no hell '
the man had said for 60 years, but that
night when I looked in the dying room
of my infidel neighbor there was some
thing on his countenance which seemed
to say, "There is, there is, there is,
there is!" The mightiest restraints
today against theft, against immorality,
against libertinism, against crime of all
sorts-the mightiest restraints are the
retributions of eternity. Men know
that they can escape the law, but down
in the offenders' soul there is the realiza
tion of the fact that they cannot escape
God. He stands at the end of
the road of profligacy, and he
will not clear the guilty. Take
all idea of retribution and punish
ment out of the hearts and minds of
men, and it would not be long before
our cities would become Sodoms. The
only restraints against the evil passions
of the world today are Bible restraints.
Suppose now these generals of athe
ism and infidelity got the victory and
suppose they marshaled a great arny
made up of the majority of the world.
They are in companies, in regiments, in
brigades-the whole army. Forward,
march, ye hosts of infidels and atheists,
banners flying before, banners flying
behind, banners inscribed with the
words: "No God! No Christ! No Pun
ishment! No Restraints! Down With
the Bible! iDo as You Please!" The
sun turned into darkness!
Forward, march, ye great army of in
fidels and atheists! And first of all you
will attack the churches. Away with
those houses of worship! They have
been standing there so 1ling deluding
the people with consolation in their
bereavements and sorrows. All those
churches ought to be extirpated, they
have done so much to relieve the lost
and bring home the wandering, and
they have so long held up the idea of
eternal rest after the paroxysm of this
life is over. Turn the St. Peters and
St. Pauls and the temples and taber
nacles into clubhouses. Away with
those churches!
Forward. march, ye great army of in
fidels and atheists, and next of all they
scatter the Sabbath schools filled with
bright eyed, rosy-cheeked little ones
who are singing songs on Sunday after
noon and getting instruction when they
ought to be on the street corners play
ing marbles or swearing on the com
mons. Away with them! Forward,
march, ye great army of infidels and
atheists, and n. xt of all they will at
tack Christian asylums the institutions
of mercy supported by Christian phi
lanthropies. Never mind the blind
eyes and the deaf ears and the crippled
limbs and the darkened intellects. Let
paralyzed old age pick up its own food
and orphans fight their own way and
the half reformed go back to their evil
habits. Forward, march, ye great army
of infidels and atheists, and with your
bat tleaxes hew down the cross and split
up tile manger of Bethlehem.
On, ye great army of infidels and
atheists, and now they come to the
graveyards and the cemeteries of the
earth. Pull down the sculpture above
Greenwood's gate, for it means the
Resurrection. Tear away at the en
trance of Laurel Hill the figure of Old
Mortality and the chisel. On, ye
great army of infidels and atheists, into
the grrveyards and cemeteries, and
where you see "Asleep In Jesus" cut
it away, and where you find a marble
story of heaven blast it, and where you
find over a little child's grave "Suffer
Little Children to Come Unte Me" sub
stitute the words "delusion" and
"sham." and where you find an angel in
marble strike off the wings, and when
you come to a family vault chisel on the
door, "Dead once, dead forever."
But on, ye great army of infidels aud
atheists, on! They will attempt to
scale heaven. There are heights to be
taken. Pile hill on hill and Pelton
upon Ossa, and then they hoist the lad
ders against the walls of heaven. On
and on until they blow up the founda
tions of jasper and the gates of Pearl.
They charge up the steep. Now they
aim for the throne of him who liveth
forever and ever. They would take
down from their high place the Father,
the Son, the Holy Ghost. "Down
with them!V they say. "Down
with them from the throne!" they say.
"Down forever! Down out of sight!
He is not God. He has no right to
sit there. Down with him! Down
with Christ?
uh, my friends, there has never been
such a nefarious plot on earth as that
which infidelity and atheism have plan
ned. We were shocked a few years ago
because of the attempt to blow up the
fidclity and atheism succeed in their
attempt they will dynamite a world.
Let them have their full way, and this
world will be a habitation of three rooms
-a habitation of just three rooms, the
one a madhouse. another a lazaretto,
the other a pandemonium. These infi
del bands of music have only just begun
their concert-yea, they have only
been stringing their instruments. I
today put before you their whole pro
gramine from beginn ing unto the close.
In the theater the tragedy comes first
and the farce afterward, but in this in
fidel drama of death the farce comes
first and the tragedy afterward. And
in the former atheists and infidels laugh
and mock, but in the latter God him
self will laugh and mock. He says so.
"I will laugh at their calamity and
mock when their fear cometh."
From such a chasm of individual, na
tional, worldwide ruin, stand back.
Oh, young men, stand back from that
chasm! You see the practical drift of
my sermon. I want you to know where
that road leads. Stand back from that
chasm of ruin. The time is going to
come (you and I may not live to see it,
but it will come; just as ceitainly as
there is a God it will come) when the
infidels and the atbeists who openly
and out and out and above board preach
and practice infidelity and atheists will
be considered as criminals against so
ciety, as they are now criminals against
God. Society will push out the leper,
and the wretch with soul gangrened
and ichorous and vermin covered and
rotting apart with his beastiality will
be left to die in the ditch and be denied
decent burial, and men will come with
spades and cover up the carcass where
it falls, that it poison not the air, and
and the only text in all the Bible ap
propriate for the funeral sermon will be
Jeremiah xxii, 19, "le shall be buried
with the burial of an ass."
A thousand voices come up to me
this hour saying: "Do you really think
infidelity will succeed? Has Christi
tianity received its deathblow? and will
the Bible become obsolete?" Yes,
when the smoke of the city chimney
arrests and destroys the noonday sun.
Josephus says about the time of the de
struction of Jerusalem the sun was
turned into darkness, but only the
clouds rolled between the sun and the
earth. The sun went right on. It is
the same sun, the same luminary, as
when at the beginning it shot out like
an electric spark from God's finger, and
today it is warming the nations, and to
day it is gilding-le sea, and toda.
is filling the earth with its light. 'I..
same old sun, not at all wornor,
though its light steps 190,000,000 m' 1
a second, though its pulsations are
450,000,000,000,000 undulations i.1 a
second. The same sun with beaut'ful
white light made up of the violet, and
the indigo, and the blue, and the green
and the red, and the yellow, and the
orange-the seven beautiful colors now
just as when the solar spectrum first
divided them.
At the beginning God said: "Let there
be light," and light was, and light is and
light shall be. So Christianity is roll
ing on, and it is going to warm all na
tions, and all nations are to bask in
its light. Men may shut the window
blinds so they cannot see it, or they
may smoke the pipe of speculation un
til they are shadowed under their own
vaporing, but the Lord God is a sun!
This white light of the gospel made up
of all the beautiful colors of earth and
heaven-violet plucked from amid the
spring grass, and the indigo of the
southern jungles, and the blue of the
skies, and the green of the foliage, and
the yellow of the autumnal woods, and
the orange of the southern groves, and
the red of the suns~ts. All the beau
ties of earth and heaven brought. out
by this spiritual spectrum. Great
Britain is going to take all Europe for
God. The United States are going to
take America for God. Both of them
together will take all Asia for God.
All three of them will take Africa for
God. "Who art thou, 0 great moun
tain? Before Zerubbabel thou shalt
become a plain." "The mouth of the
Lord hath spoken it." Halleluiah,
amen!
Pure Food Wanted
Some very interesting and instructive
facts have been brought out by the
Senatorial Committee with regard to
the general adulteration of commercial
food products in this country.
Prof. Mitchell, chemist of the Wis
consin Dairy and Food Commission,
said that the use of ant iseptics as pre
servatives has become "alarmingly
great." They ar& used extensively,
ha explained, to color and keep milk
and butter, one of them in general use
being a chemical which "acts disas
trously on the tissues of the stomach.
Others," he added, are used on chopped
meats, bulk meats, oysters, fish and
hams, and possibly on corned beef."
He also told of a drug that is "exten
sively sold to butchers for the purpose
of making their Hamburger steaks last
and keep up a healthy appearance--at
the expense, of course, of the healthy
appearance and lasting qualities of the
people who eat such meat.
Dr. Wiley, the Government export.
gave the cheering information that he
identified one of the meat preserving
preparations as ''the same which wat
formerly used at some of the medical
colleges to preserve corpses obtained
for dissection, and is now occasionally
put to service in disinfecting houses,
where smallpox patients have resided."
The materials commonly used "for
the majority of jellies, manufactured
nowadays," according to several wit
nesses, are the cores and parings of ap
ples," the substance of which "is mix
ed with glucose in large quantities
with sugar in small quantities, and then
colored and flavored to suit the label on
thepackage."
In commenting on the above the
News and Courier very truly says that
in view of these, and the many other
like revelations recently made before
the committee, and elsewhere, there
are many thousands of people who
would be very glad to get certainly hour
est and pure food products-jellies,
butter, meats, baking powder, and so
on-and to pay well for them. Any
enterprising pers'n or corporation in
the South should find a good profit in
supying tplhe demand in any part.
A Big Mill.
A charter has been applied for the
Olympia cotton mills of Columbia It s
capital will be $1,500,000. The power
will be electricity, furnished by the
power plant on the Columbia canal. It
will be the largest mill in the south,
having 104,000 spindles and 2,600
looms. The corporators are Columbia's
mill and bank presidents and leading
business men.
OverlookedCoogler.
W. D. Howells, the n >velist, in an
article in the North American Review,
puts Rudyard Kipling and William
Watson at the head of the living poets
of the English-speah ng world and giv.es
James Whitcomb Riley first place
among distinctively American poets of
the day. Can it be that Howells has
-never heard of J. Gordon Coogler, the
bard of the Congaree? Not to know
I Mooler arges oane's .%f nn',n.
A NEGRO DBGPERADO:
Re kills One Policemen and Wounds
Another,
In Washington, D. C., last Wednes
day Humphrey Taylor, a Negro sus
pected of the Rosenstein murder at Sli
dell, Md., shot and killed Police Ser
geant Fritz Passau, wounded Police
man Gow and kept a posse of a half
dozen officers at bay from the loft of a
house for nearly two hours.
Dozens of shots were exchanged be
tween the officers and the fugitive who
only surrendered when preparations
were made to burn the premises. Last
Saturday morring week Louis Rosen
stein and his vife, who kept a small
store at Slidell, were found insensible
and horribly wounded in their store
room. Rosenstein soon died from his
njuries and the woman is believei to
be near death. Suspicion fell upon a
Negro named Humphrey Taylor, alias
Br~wn, w .o had disappeared.
A Negro answering the description of
Taylor was seen last Saturday evening,
and information received by the police
led them to believe their man was liv
ing in a small house about a quarter of
a mile west of Georgetown. Early
Saturday morning Taylor .as seen to
enter the place and word wab immediate
ly sent to the nearest precinct station
and a posse of officers hurried to the
place. The men were posted about the
house while Passau, Gow and another
officer attempted to gain entrance
through the front door.
Finally the door was forced. The
two small rooms on the first floor were
empty and the officers ascended to the
second story. The front room was also
untenanted, and as the men passed
into the rear apartmomt, Taylor opened
fire from the trap door of a cock loft in
which he had taken refuge.
Sergeant Passau sank to the floor
dead with two bullets through his chest.
Policeman Gow opened fire through the
trap but failed to hit the fugitive. Gow
received a bullet in his right hand, bad
ly shattering it and another struck his
metal badge and glanced downward the
entire length of his coat. The reserves
of Lwo precincts were called out and the
house surrounded. The shooting, mean
while, had attracted several thousand
persons. Occasionally the Negro would
fire a shot at the officers and immediate
a volley would answer it, but no one
.ias hurt.
With revolvers in hand they watched
every window and tried several ruses
to draw Taylor's fire. He seemed to
have an unlimited supply of ammuni
tion. Finally, concluding that he
would not surrender, District Commis
sioner Wright directed the police to
fire the premises. A mattress was se
cured, saturated with oil and the offi
cers began to remove the furniture.
Seeing his game was hopeless, Taylor
surrendered. Surrounded by officers
with drawn revolvers he was hustled
out of the house to the patrol wagon,
when the crowd surged forward with
shouts of "Lynch him!" "Burn him!"
and made a rush for the prisoner. A
rope was secured and the mob made a
desperate effort to place it around the
wretch's neck. The coolness of the of
ficers, however, saved Taylor, though
he was rather badly disfigured by blows
from the nearest of the crowd.
Upon searching the premises the po
lice found $192 and a gold watch and
chain, where he had secreted them.
He had a diamond ring and a small
sum of money on his person.
A Growing Town.
The receipts of cotton at Houston,
Texas, since the first of September,
1898, passed the point of 2,500,000 bales
Friday last. This is a wvonderful re
cord, and places Houston ahead of eith
er Galveston or New Orleans as a cotton
receiving and distributing point. Ten
years ago Lhe receipts of cotton at
Houston did not exceed a half million
bales a year. Since then it has become
one of the greatest railway centres of
the country, at least 15 railroads cen
tering there and reaching most of the
cotton producing territory west of the
the Mississippi.
A Fortune in a Sewer.
A descender into the Paris drains
named Osais made a Monte Cristo sort
of diocovery one night in the big sewer
under the Rue Marie Stuart, not far
from the Central markets. He had
just gone down below to do some sweep
ing and was working on the side path
of the drain, when he saw a large packet
lying close to the wall. He opened it
and found inside a heap of railway and
other securities, which he immediately
took to the nearest police commissary.
The bonds and obligations found are
worth 8120.000 and Osais was compli
mented on his honesty. It is supposed
that the securities were either lost by
a bank messenger or were dropped into
the drain by a pursued thief, who had
resolved to do away with all evidences
of his guilt.
May Cause Her Death.
Near Starr, in Anderson county. a
deplorable incident occurred Monday
Liight utiit threatens to claim the life
of a prominent farmer's wife. A Negro
man and his wife on Mr. B. F. Gen
try's place had quarreled and the latter
had fled the former's violence and
sought refuge in Mr. Gentry's house.
The enraged husband, locating her and
being ordered from the house by Mr.
Gentry, proceeded to break down the
door, so frightening Mrs. Gentry, who
was in a delicate condition, that he~r
life is despaired of. The Negro has
been punished, though to what extent
is not yet known, as he is still in the
hands of indignant citizens.
A Rich Beggar.
Charles Burkowitz, a blind beggar of
New York, who for a long time has fre
quented the shopping district of the
metropolis and who was arrested the
other day for insulting a woman who re
fused to give to him, is said to be the
owner of two tenements, each valued at
$25,000, and to have large sums of
money in several of the savings banks
of the city.
"Ix a home in the country not far
from town," says the Cattlettsbuirg,
Ky. Indepenedent, "there may be seen
quite a pile of set ing lying on the floor
nearly in the middle of the room, that
has been undisturbed for more than six
months. At that time the head of the
house wanted a chair, and seeing but
one handy, he dumped to the floor the
sewing which lay upon it. His wife
asked him to pick it up. He said he
wouldn't do it. She told him as he
threw it there it could remain until he
got reatiy to pick it up. She would
nover touch it, and there it remains, a
memorial to an incompatibility of dis
position."
THE Massachusetts House has voted,
107 to 59. in favor of a direct i iheri
tance tax on personal property. An
exemption of $10,000 is provided for,
and the tax is graded from 1 per cent
on inheritances not exceeding $50,000
I to a maximum of 8 per cent on those
PEATS OF MEMORY.
ttories of FamouA Men With Remarkabli
Memorizing Facilities.
Scaliger, the philologist of the six
teenth century, who edited several of
the classics, was so certain of his mem
ory that he undertook to repeat long
passages from Latin works with a dag
ger at his breast, which was to be used
against him in the event of his memory
failing, while Seneca, the tutor of
Nero, could repeat two thousand words
exactly as he heard them.
Pope could turn at once to any pass
age which had struck him when read
ing; and Leyden, the Scottish poet,
who died in the early part of the cen
tury, was also remarkable for his mem
ory.
When congratulated, on one occasion,
upon his aptitude for remembering
things, Dryden replied that he often
found his memory a source of incon
venience. Surprise was expressed at
this, whereupon the poet replied that
he often wished to recall a particular
passage, but could not do so until he
had repeated the whole poem from the
beginning to where the passage occur
red which he wished to recall.
Leyden is also credited with having
been able to repeat an act of parlia
ment or a lengthy legal document after
having heard it only once.
The newspapers of January, 1820,
contain a number of allusions to the
case of a man named Thomson, who
drew plans of a dozen London parishes,
including every church, chapel, yard,
court, monument, lamp post and innu
merable trees and pumps without refer
ence to a single book and without ask
ing a single question.
An English clergyman mentions a
man of weak intellect, who lived about
the same time, who could remember the
nan:es and ages of every man, woman
and child who had been buried in the
parish during 35 years, together with
the dates of burial and the names of
the mourners who were present at the
funeral.
Food Wrapped In Paper.
It is a very common practice to put
away food that comes from the shop in
the brown paper in which the dealer
wraps it. While this may be conven
ient, it certainly is open to serious ob
jection on the score of health and
cleanliness. Most of the cheap papers
are made from materials hardly up to
the standard of the housekeeper's ideas
of neatness; and although a certain de
gree of heat is employed In their prep
aration it is by no means sufficient to
destroy all the disease germs with
which the raw material may be filled.
When it is taken Into consideration
that waste papers of all sorts, and those
used for all purposes, are gathered up
and worked over into new paper to
wrap our food in, it behooves the
housewife who cares for the health of
her family to see to it that articles of
food remain in contact with such
wrapping the very shortest possible
time.
It is not unusual to see meat, butter,
cheese and other extremely susceptible
articles put away in the very cheapest,
commonest brown paper.
Immediately upon the receipt of soft
groceries or fruits they should be put
into earthen dishes, and under no cir
cumstances should they be allowed to
remain in the papers In which they
are delivered.
It is useless to expect that a better
class of paper will be employed, and
so we may as well make up our minds
to guard against the trouble -by shift
ing all articles of food to some dish
that Is absolutely free from contami
nating elements.
sleeping Machines.
Experiments have been made re
cently with some curious devices in the
shape of "sleep machines." Sleep will
sometimes result from fatigue of the
eyes. Dooking at trees or other ob
jects as we rush along in the train will
frequently "send us off."
An ingenious gentleman has pro
duced a machine for this purpose. It
Is a box surmounted by two fan-like
panels, one above the other, revolving
horizontally in opposite directions.
These panels are studded with mirrors
that throw upon the retina a vibrating
flood of twinkling light.
A similar effect Is produced by star
ing at a bright ball placed high above
the hand, so that some slight strain Is
caused by staring at it.
Another apparatus for causing drow
siness Is formed of clamps for squeez
ing the arteries leading to the brain.
The clamps remain in -position for less
than half a minute, and by that time
the sufferer from insomnia has been
placed in a state of somnolence by the
decreased flow of blood to the brain.
Still another method Is to arrange
an elastic battery in the bed so that a
mild electric current acts upon the
spine.
Remarkable Longevity.
In a southern family lives an old
man named Jeff, who has been with
them and the previous generation for
more years than they can remember.
Hie is certainly pretty old himself, 8o
his mistress was rather surprised when
he asked to have a few days off to go,
as he put it, "up to de old state of New
Haven," to see his aunt.
"Why, Jeff," said the lady, "your
aunt must be pretty old, isn't she?"
"Yes'm," he replied; "yes'm; my
aunt must be pretty ole now-she's
about 105 years old now."
"A hundred and five years!" exclaim
ed the lady. "Why, what on earth is
she doing up there in New Haven?"
"Deed, I don't know what she's do
n', ma'am," rejoined Jeff, in all ser
iousness; "she's up dere livin' wid her
grandmnother!"
Wine-testers eat a small piece of
bread with a scrap of cheese, between
samples, to Insure an unprejudiced
tasta. ___________
TrE sentiment of the Northern
' pie on the subject of lynching, in
ertain caqes, is not all one way, it ap
ewr. The~ Albany, N. Y., Argus
:-' h Rev. A. D. Carlisle, a
Pknusylvania Presbyterian, declares
heia lynching under certain conditions
is justifiable, and that under certain
ircumstances he would cheerfully pull
he rope. Spoken like a true man,
who is not afraid to speak candidly.
Under certain circumstances'- namely,
he crime against woman-what man
with a spark of manhood in his heart
would hesitate to avenge by summary
eans the honor and safety of his
ousehold?"
THlE Boston Journal says: "It isn't
ften that an American ship refuses to
end a helping cable, but when the
ransport Senator, on April 30, five
undred miles out from San Francisco,
met the disabled steamer Elihu Thomp
on, there was no choice for her but to
o right on. Her orders wcrc to pro
eed to Manila "with all speed." War
s an imperative master. No doubt re
ief will reach the Thompson in some
LOVE SON .
Oh, better than stars or sun,
Oh, better than moon or foam
Of the broken wave in summer cave
When the green sea thunders home:
Oh, better nan swallow's flight
O'er the clear stained dawning pale,
Or the long delight thro' the rose-steep
ed night
Of the love-drunk nightingale;
Yea!-better than angel's song
That wins with a love divine
Is the light that wakes in thine eyes
when breaks
My soul from my lips to thine.
THE GRAY TOWER.
What I am going to tell you is not
really the whole of the tale, but only
the first chapter; yet it is a good story
in itself, and there are some things
which make me unwilling to say all
I know, at least in print.
The Gray Tower was the southeast
corner turret of that stone building
which stood until quite recently on
Waverley place, at the corner of Wash
ington square. It had a picturesque
effect as you walked down University
place from Union Square, and it was
almost the only romantic building in
New York.
My first chapter opens on a winter's
day about 1890 or 1892, if I recollect
rightly. It was snowing heavily as T
stepped into Broadway, and I turned
up my collar and stood a moment ir
resolute. The old horse cars jangled
by with Weir bells muffled in the
snowy storm; the tall newspaper offices
across City Hall square twinkled and
shone from their thousand windows,
and I was slowly turning toward the
Park place station, when I saw what
I guessed, even at that distance. to be
a familiar figure cross the brilliant
light of one of the highest windows on
the other side of the square. It was
Collins. No one else moved about a
room in just that loping, darting man
ner. I knew it was his office, and I
knew he was the very man I wanted
to see before dinner. I hurried over
to Park Row and was shot up to his
floor.
"Hullo, old man; busy?"
"No, no; come in."
Collins sat under an electric light, a
pair of shears in his hand and a sea
of papers tossing round him. He part
ed the red hair back from his forehead
with his left hand, and looked up
quickly with that childish, gnome-like
smile, and the piercing, glittering, blue
eye-light, that his friends knew so
well. Suddenly he dropped the shears
and ran his long, conspicuous hand
hurridly through the stack of old pa
pers he had been clipping.
"Look here, look here! This is what
you ought to see! Where is that copy?"
"What are you looking for?"
"Something I found this afternoon.
It's a romance; a whole story of forty
years ago; the most startling piece of
fiction in real life. And not a 'scare
head' to It! 0, those felows didn't
know how to make up a paper!"
(Fumbling all the, time and rummag
ing with that aggressive hand.) "Now,
I have lost it. Where in the name of
seven-"
Then he swore feverishly in a high
minor guttural.
"Ah, here it is. Look at that, look
at that!"
His eyes were like glowing steely
gimlets, and the perspiration started
on his temples in his excitement. It
was nothing but an old scrap of un
believable romance he had unearthed.
It had no possible use to him. But
he was always a tinder-box of en
thusiasm, and fired like a child at
small things. Collins has no particular
part in this story, yet I can never dis
sociate him from it. Its strange un
explainable quality has a certain kin
ship with his half-canny personality,
so that I never recall it without feeling
his eyes burning into me with in
credulity and delight and defiance and
mockery, as he handed me that torn
issue of a New York journal of half
century ago.
As he said, they made little display
of startling matter in those days, and
the story, as I remember, was told in
that brief, sober way which has since
become almost extinct among news
paper men.
Briefly, it was an account of a
strange discovery made by some work
men who had been repairing one of
the towers of the old building on
Washington square. In making their
renovations they had come upon a dis
used closet, whose door had been
bricked up and roughly plastered over.
On the closet floor, covered with im
palpable dust, clothed in her silk even
ing dress, lay the beautiful specter
of a woman.
I say specter, for it seems destruc
tion had come upon her so gently, so
furtively, that her body was almost
unmarred, except for the dinginess of
where she lay, or there had been some
time. There are records of such in
stances, showing that dissolution is
not always swift to follow death. But
whether the present case had been due
to the sealing of the narrow room
chemical treatment of her body and
garments after death, was all surmise.
But there was the fact. On the dusty
floor, in a little apartment scarcely
larger than an ample bath, as if she
had fallen in a faint, with one arm
spread abroad and the other hand at
her throat slept young beauty, arrest
ed in mid pleasure (so she looked), and
held there in duress while the busy
round of life rumbled in the streets
below. It must have been the very
pathos and wistfulness of beauty-the
image of that shadowy loveliness,
snatched away from the midst of joy
and gayety, so untimely, and not even
allowed the common boon of oblivion.
Where was she all this while, the radi
ant spirit who had dwelt in that come
ly tenement? Had she herself, too,
like her frail, indestructible person,
been held in suspense somewhere,
neither among the living nor the dead?
It was white, white silk and a mass
of white lace, that she was dressed in.
And under the soilure of dust the pale
gold of her hair was shining and alive.
But the only clew to her identity was
the small cambrie handkerchief, In
itialed in one corner N. D.
When I had read the article. Collins
said:
"How's that?"
"Fine."
"Why don't you inveStigate it?"
"Investigate it? What Is there to ine
restigate? This is all ancient history."
"Well, perhaps. Still, I have an idea.
You know the building don't you?'
"Yes, I have seen It. I have novel
been in it." I answered.
"Very good," said he, "Now I knoWt
an old fellow who lives there; hal
rooms in one of the towers; the towel
n the southeast corner. I'll give you
a card to him. Go and see him. He uI
'ull of stories of the building; has had
a roost there for fifteen years or more,
and, if you can get him to talk, you
may hear something."
Collins gave his gnome-like inscruta
le, childish laugh, and his eyes danced
I elfish glee. He might have known
verything or noth.ng at that very
minute.
"-What sort is he?" I asked.
"Well, he Is old, queer, a character,
a gentleman. You must be punctili
us. You must be ceremonious. Hand
im your card along with mine when
you knock at his door. And by the
ay, you will have no trouble finding
he room. Enter from either side,
wilk to the middle of the long hall,
hen turn to the east out into the court,
and after that in at anotner door to
he south; then climb stairs until you
an climb no more, and knock any
where in the dark ahead of you. You
an't miss the door. If you feel calre
Makes the food more d
so imano a
inat will please him netter.
*And what time should I call?"
"This is as good a time as any. You
would be sure to find him in about
this hour."
"Very good." I said. "I will go up
there now. Give me your card."
Collins scribbled a line on his card
introducing me to Nicholas Denny,
Esq., and I left him-not, however, be
fore I had time to catch another mock
ing smile as it vanished from his eager
face.
In less than half an hour I was cross
ing Washington square in the gaslit
gloom, with the gray bulk of the uni
versity rising before me. I went by
to the Waverly place entrance, pushed
in the heavy, clanging door, and walk
ed along the low hall, as Collins di
rected me; then I turned to the left
into the area, and next to the right in
to another hall of the building. Then I
began to climb the stairs, three or four
flights, lit by a single, flickering gas
jet on each one. At the top of these
I was in the last hall, as I thoifght,
with several doors going in to it; and
I fancied I must have made some mis
take when I noticed in the farther dark
end of the hall a space blacker than
the blackness, opening high Sp from
floor to ceiling, like a gorge in the
mountains, and right up this gorge the
narrow treads of yet anotaer stair
leading Into pitchy darkness, with
sheer wall on either hand. There was
nothing for it but to venture. Up I
climbed, step by step, until suddenly
a crack of light at my feet, a little to
the left, told me I must be on his land
ing.
I stepped quietly to the. door, felt
for the knocker-a huge old affair,
very stiff In the joints-and knocked.
A chair moved inside, and I heard
the rustle of curtains or draperies.
Then steps came slowly, stopping al
together once or twice, and opened the
door to me.
"Mr. Denny?" said I.
"Yes, sir."
"Mr. Denny, may I have the honor
of presenting an introduction from my
friend Mr. Collins?"
"Certainly, sir-certainly; and very
pleased to see you, too. Walk in, sir,
and pray be seated. Sit you down by
the fire; you must be chilly. A dis
agreeable evening is It not?"
"Yes, it is cold; but you are very
cozy up here, all by yourself."
"Oh, yes, snug enough. You see, I
have the whole tower to myself, small
as It Is. '.Lere is no one else' on the
same floor. That is something."
We drew our chairs up to the fire.
The fireplace, like the room, was nar
row and tall, with a small grate of
coals high up from the floor in the old
fashioned way. The room might have
been sixteen by twelve and was very
lofty.
All the upper walls and the ceiling
were painted a heavy dark blue, which
swallowed up all the light the fire
and one candle in a silver candle-stick
could give. The door by which I had
entered was in one corner, and the
fireplace in the middle of the other
side. Directly opposite the fireplace
was a wide double doorway hung with
heavy portiercs which were closeu.
The old gentleman talked easily,
with a smile, spreading out his hands
to the fire. He seemed just the one to
be full of stories and traditions of the
place, and I only waited the opportuni
ty to interest him in that direction.
"Yes, I said in reply to his last re
mark, "the atmosphere of one's sur
roundings is z ore important than the
surroundings themselves;' don't you
think so?"
"Ah, yes, indeed; that is very true."
"And your atmosphere here is so ro
mantic. There is really no other place
like this in the city. I should think
there would be innumerable tales
about it; are there not :"
But he froze at this; gathered his
fingers In from the blaze and opened
them wide two or three times before
he spoke; and I caught a sudden hunt
ed glance quite out of keeping with
his courtly demeanor.
He seemed to consider before he
said:
"Yes, yes, Indeed, I believe there are
many legends about the old building.
I hear them repeated from time to
time; and usually they have been a
good deal embellished-a good deal em
belished. Veracity is a difficult accom
plishment, sir."
And he turned to me with the most
winning and wise smile. I said noth
ing, and he relapsed into his attitude
of consideration, watching the fire. It
was just here that a curious thing hap
pened. I leaned my head back on the
easy chair a moment, waiting for him
to take up the conversation where lhe
had left it with hesitation. As I did
so I noticed for the first time a small
mirror hung over the fireplace, and in
it I could see t..e dull green portiers
behind us. I thought how restful the
color was to the eye. And then, about
five feet from the floor, they parted
and a girlish face looked through and
roguishly surveyed our backs. She
smiled very merrily, and pressed the
soft curtains against her yellow hair;
then her dancing eyes ran unsuspect
ingly over th~e mirror and caught mine
fairly watching her and she vanished,
in consternation as it seemed.
"Oho!" thought L.
But the old man gave no sign, and
I, of course, said nothing. Yeracity Is
a dizscult accomplishment.
The little by-play was over in a few
seconds-almost before my old friend
could take up a new sentence.
"You see, sir" (beginning with a long
breath, and gazing into the fire), "you
see, sir, one looks at things differently
at your time of life. Truth seems quite
true, and falsehood quite false to you,
no doubt. But, when you come along
to sixty, it will not appear so easy all
offhand. And somehow, do you know,
the little broken Incidents of life often
please me best, the stories that have
been left unfinished and will never be
finished for us, perhaps. Not that 1
love the Venus more because she has
lost her arms, poor lady; still the loss
adds a wistfulness; and wistfulness,
when you come to think of It, is a very
large part of the charm of art.
"I have just such a one of those tiny
incomplete dramas in my mind now.
I have not quite filled out the whole
circle of the plot from the small arc
which has come under my notice, but
I shall, perhaps."
Here he turned and smiled again
doubtfully at me.
"It is a very interesting--a very im
teresting tangle of events, I am quite
sure. Perhaps you know this large
hotel on Broadway in the next block
to us? Yes? It is muca affected by
Southerners. I believe. However.
that is neither here nor there, perhaps.
At all events, there was an alarm of fire
sounded shortly after midnight one
February many years ago. I was liv
ing not far from here, and was just
coming home when I heard th'e com
motion. As I reached the square, com
ng down Fifth avenue. i saw the!
smoke and flames in the direction of
Broadway, and hurrieci to the scene
with half a dozen companions.
"When we reached the hotel the
flames were spri. ging out of the third
floor windows. There did not seem to
be any Immediate danger to the in
i ates. The fire r-as evidently confined
to one or two rooms. Suddenly a man,
P1OWDERI
hURE
elicious and wholesome
808N CS., MiW YUSC.
oartially undressed I snould say, ror
Y take it he had just laid aside his
coat), rushed to the window next the
one where the fire was fiercest and
flung it open. We saw the room burn
ing behind him. He put one foot on
the sill. 'Make a rope, make a rope,'
someone shouted from below.
"He was too dazed for that. He
vaulted through the window and
struck the iron paling as he fell.
"When my friends and I rushed for
ward he lay moaning on the pavement:
'No, no; I'm done for. No, no!' Then
le swooned, and we eased him where
he lay, expecting he would die in a
moment. - But he turned on his side,
pulling feebly at his collar with his
right hand. I loosened his cravat, and
as I did so the fluttering fingers caught
at a thin gold chain round his neck,
snapped it and plucked themselves
away in a weak spasm, grasping some
thing in their clench. Then his eyes
opened in terror and a wailing, broken
voice came to us: 'She can't get out;
she can't get out; she-can-nt-get
out! Ah, dear God!" and it died into
a moan again and he was quite still,
with the shut right hand beside him.
We thought him gone. But in another
moment he looked up quiet quietly at
me and smiled, as if we were qld ac
quaintances. 'My friend,' he said-'you
must keep it,' and he moved his prec
ious handful toward me. It slipped,
and with a sigh he was dead."
"I have his keepsake," the old gen
tleman continued; "it is a very curious
piece of jewel work."
Here he arose and went to a cabinet
in the corner.
A very curious piece of handicraft,
you will say. If you care for such
things you must examine this.'
The coals fell in the grate, and a
desolate street cry came up from the
world below us, but the room was very
still. He came back to the Are and
showed me in his open-hand a large
gold locket, apparently of Indian de
sign, rough and effective.
"How beautiful it is," he said, and
his fingers dwelt on it gently before he
cave it to me to handle.
STORY OF A DIVER.
Perilous Adventures of a Man Whose
Daily Work in Under River or Se.
Diver Robert E. Case of Portland,
in the course of his ten years' employ
ment as a diver has had many interest
ing experiences and close calls from
death.
Chase Is about 35 years of age, stands
about 5 feet 10 inches and weighs over
160 pounds, and Is one of the pleasant
est men that one would care to meet.
He Is very modest-seldom talkin
about his own work, but a while
ago the writer succeeded in getting him
to tell a few of his experiences.
Probably one of the most important
jobs upon which he ever worked, and
certainly one of the longest, was the
laying of the water pipes across the
Kennebec River at Bath. This job re
quired the laying of 3,000 feet of big
waterpipe, with a ball and sockA join
in water, the average depth of which
was fifty feet. Sometimes the depth was
over seventy and at times down to
about thirty. The conditions that pre
vailed at that point were such that the
divers could only work upon the tide,
and so It took from August until the
following April to complete the job.
A few years ago Mr. Chase nearly
lost his life while at work raising a
sloop which had sunk in Boothbay
Harbor. He got fouled with the cable
of a buoy which marked the location
of the wreck, and was hung up for
fprty minutes. His air hose was
caught In such a way that but very lit
tle air could get through it with the
pump working to its best advantage,
but the pump was an old one and did.
not work well. When he was finally
cleared and hauled to the surface he
was unconscious and black In the face
from the want of air. It was feared
that he would die, but he recovered,
and on the next day went down and
finished the work of raising the sloop.
Proba'bly~ the closest call that Chase
ever had was while using dynamite to
blow out the pilings of an old bridge.
which had been torn down. His ten
der was a new one, who had never
worked for a diver before. Chase went
down and placed the stick of dynamite
In position and started to come back to
where he would be hauled to the sur
face. He had covered part of the dis
tance when he discovered a pile that
would not have to be blown, but which
could readily be hoisted to the surface
with a rope, and sIgnalled the tender
to send him down a rope.
The tender misunderstood the signal,
and, turning to the man who was look
ing after the battery, called out:
"It's all right, fire the charge!"
Now it happened that the man who
was looking after the battery was an
old and experienced tender and knew
hat it wasn't all right to fire the
charge while the man was under water.
He went to the aide of the float and
took hold of the lifeline just in time to
receive the second signal for a rope
from Chase. The rope was sent down,
but it was night before Chase knew of
his narrow escape. The tender who
came near ending Chase's experience
as a diver only worked one more day
and then quit-he never came around
after his pay, either.
It was while at work on this job
that Chase, together with his tender
and helpers, was blown up by'a dyna
mite explosion. He had been down
and placed the charge, but the tide,
which was setting out strong, washed
it down almost under the float. Chase
had just reached the top and leaned
over the side of the float in the usual
attitude of divers when resting,-when
te charge was exploded. The shock
threw the fioat and all the men into the
a--, and Chase must surely have been
trown into the water but for the
presence of mind of the same man who
saved him the other time, who caught
him and held him on the float.
The wonder of this accident was that
ay ote came out of It alive, for upon
the float was a case of 100 sticks of
dynamite, which, fortunately, was not
exleded by the shock.
hase says the most disagreeable
prt of his work is diving for dead
bo~es. He has made several quick re
coeries of bodies during his career as
a diver. One of thease was In Ijewiston
about two years ago, when he recover
ed the body of a Bates College student
named Wells. In just nineteen min
utes from the time he dove he had the
body out of the water upon the bank.
The deepest water In which he ever
woked was off Egg Rock, near Bar
Harbor. Here he was dowP. 100 feet at
work- up.- th wreck of a Gloucester