Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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WE GUARANTEE The Reliability of Every Adver tiser Who Uses the Col umns of This Paper. The Ledger F. G. Htacv. President. J. G. Wabdlaw. Vice President THE NATIONAL BANK OF GAFFNEY. Capital $50,000.00. Wu.r. buy county claims, receive deposit smd iiKii.e lliH-riil loans on approved paper is. <Ross. <'sisliier. A Newspaper in all that the Word Implies and Devoted to the Best Interests of the People of Cherokee County. ESTABLISHED FEB. 1C, 1894. GAFFNEY CITY, S. C.. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1898. *1.00 A YEAR. BILL ARP SAYS HE’S A BOY. HE MAKES HIMSELF USEFUL ABOUT THE HOUSE. He Makes Fires, Sweeps the Floors and Runs Errands—Bill Reads a G. A. R. Paper and then Loses His Temper. [Bill Arp in Atlanta Constitution.] “Oh, would I were a boy a^ain,” Bays the poet. That’s what I am. There is no other boy about these premises. We have had no cook for two months—no man servant nor maidservant—only a boy. I rise be fore the sun, make the lire, take up the ashes, sweep the room, then fire up the stove in the kitchen, fill up the kettle, put on the hominy, grind the coflee and then ring the bell for my female aids de camp, who appears in due time and make biscuit and broil the steak and finish up the breakfast. I bring in wood and coal, split the pine, go to the butcher’s and baker’s and the postoflice. I’m the male boy and the mail boy. Last week was hard on me, for I had to repot the greenhouse plants and change the soil and move them into the pit and water them and yester day my female folks took a notion they wanted some of the prettiest chrysanthemums taken up and pot ted and brought into the hall, so I made little tubs out of nail kegs by sawing them down and putting rope handles to them and then I carefully upheaved the plants with a spade and got them in all right. And then the boy had to carry them in the house and arrange them and now they are beautiful to behold—all gorgeous in their lovely colors of white and yellow and brow and pink and gold. I am proud of them, for I am the boy that did it. It was heavy work and hard work and I am sorter rhei.- matic and broke down in the liner, but my folks wanted it done and J’n the boy. It isn’t every family that’s got a boy. What a luxury if is to rest when you have finished your job and arc tired! What a luxury is sleep when bedtime comes! What a wholesome, toothsome appetie does labor give and make a boy like me relish the buttered steak or smothered chicken and coffee and biscuits and gravy and big hominy and eggs fried on both sides and loose in the middle. That’s the fare to say grace over and be thankful. Labor is good medicine— a tonic that regulates digestion. La bor is an antidote for the little frets and troubles of our daily life. When I get clean out of money and the lit tle duns come thick and fast as love letters I Hy to the wood pile and chop stovevvood, or I go to the garden and fork up more ground and transplant more strawberries from the scatter ing runners. I have now 800 plants and they are line and all came from home and all have been mulched with stable manure and cottonseed and covered with pine straw, and I am the boy that did it. I am the horny- handed son of toil that you read about. My wife has got sixty-five rose bushes that I planted for her and watered and nourished and pruned and scratched my hands with the thorns, and she luxuriates among their beautiful flowers and cuts bou quets for the nabors and visitors. Sometimes when I peruse the papers and their sentiments make mo mad or fatigue my indignation I go forth among the flowers and study them and ponder upon their innocence and beauty and get calm and serene. Only yesterday I read an article in the New York Tress, the leading re publican paper, and it said the white southerner was rapidly degenerating and the negro was coming to the front; that the white man could not grow cotton at 4A cents a pound, but the negro could and that their race would in time own e.ll the lands and the whites be their tenants; that we have degenerated in statesmanship and intellect and have not got a white man in all the south wiio will com pare with Hooker Washington; that the ante-bellum types are gone; the times that produced Calhoun and Toombs and .Stephens and Davis and Benjamin and Lamar are forever past, and that our so-called states men, such as Bailey and Butler and Tillman, are but a fair sample of our degeneracy and that this degeneracy all comes from our inhuman treat ment of the negro and is a negation of God. Then he threatens us and says the North is very busy now with important concerns growing out of the Spanish war, but will attend to us in due time and see to it that we shall have no representation in Con gress where the negro ballot was in timidated or suppressed. Well, of course, I had to drop the paper and Mj to the woodpile, and every stroke I made with the ax 1 tried to imagine that malicious and malignant editor was under it. What ii to be done with such people? Here we are boasting that at last, yes at last, the sectional lines were obliter ated and we were now a reunited people, when that paper—that organ of the G. O. T. that boasts of its daily circulation being 50,000 greater than all the other Republican papers in New York and Brooklyn combined, wipes out all harmony and renews its war against the South. Isn’t it strange that he does not see the fal lacy of his argument, for if such grand men as Calhoun and Toombs and Stephens and Lamar were pro duced under the regime of slavery and we have all degenerated under the influence of freedom, why not go back to slavery again and stop that degenercy? But there is no use in replying to such men. It is a waste of time. They have fattened on the last war, and would precipitate an other if they could. That New York Tress fought Roosevelt bitterly until he was nominated, and I reckon it was because he was an illustrious scion of Southern stock, a great- grandson of Georgia’s first rebel gov- enor and a son of a noble lady who was born and reared in Georgia. Geor gia had to furnish the rebel stock for their governor and South Carolina had to furnish New York City a mayor, and it is the prevalence of Southern men and Southern blood in the city of Gotham that makes it so overwhelmingly Democratic, Tam many or no Tammany. But no more of this, I cannot rumi nate upon it with serenity. Reckon I had better go out to my garden and plant some more strawberries; and like King Ahasuerus, let my choler. Well, I came back mollified, and when my mall brought me the Balti more Sun and I read Dr. Carleton Lee, of Johns Hopkins University, on the negro, I was jubilant. It is a great paper—a bold, strong, truthful paper on the status of the negro and how to solve the race problem. Nothing so forcible, so convincing and so conservative has ever been published. Let everybody read it. But this cooking business is get ting rather monotonous to my folks. It suits me very well financially, for Ben Franklin said “that a penny saved was two pence gained,” and I paid Aunt Ann two dollars a week. I now gain four dollars a week. The trouble is that nobody pays my folks for theirs. When the cotton picking is over we can get a cook without begging. Cold weather will run them in, but they aie the same uncertain creatures they always were. They come when they please and quit when they please and don’t care a darn for the future. There isn’t a race upon earth that so enjoys today and has so little concern about to morrow. “Carpe sodiem” is their maxim. Enjoy today. “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” I think wo are getting along splendidly without them, for we have less cooking done and things last longer. Warm breakfast and supper and a cold lunch for dinner is enough unless you have company and my opinion is that during these hard times and scarcity of cooks company ought not to circulate to an alarming^extent. It is an awful mis fortune to be poor and have a rich man’s ways and it is still awfuller for a woman raised in luxury to have to come down and go from the parlor to the kitchen. As for me it doesn’t matter. I was raised poor and had to make the fires and chop the wood and go to mill and ride the mail, and so I am only being a boy again— that’s all. I am a boy. T. S.—Mr. J. W. Garder writes me from Tiller’s Ferry, S. C., and says : “As I returned from the army in 1865 and was looking over the ground where Sherman’s forces and Wheeler’s cavalry had a fight I found a lone grave with a neat little head- board marked. “W. J. L. MahafTey. supposed to belong to company .4. Cobb’s Le gion.” “I made a note of it in my memo randum book. Maybe this concerns some friend or relative. h. a. Millions Given Away. It is certainly gratifying to the public to know of one concern in the land who are not afraid to be gener ous to the needy and suffering. The proprietors of Dr. King’s New Dis covery for Consumption, Coughs and Colds, have given away over ten million trial bottles of this great medicine; and have the satisfaction of knowing it has absolutely cured thousands of hopeless cases. Asth ma, Bronchitis, Hoarseness and ail diseases of the Throat, Chest and Lungs are surely cured by it. Call on DuTre, Druggist, and get a trial bottle free. Regular size 50c. and $1. Every bottle guaranteed or price re- fnnded. Don’t attempt to determine the gender of your chickens before they are hatched. To settle the Stomach and over come the Nausea of Truspective Mothers, take Simmons Squaw Vine Wine or Tablets. You can depend on Carroll Carpen ter it Humphries as Undertakers They carry the largest assortment in that line in town, and aro ever ready to render their best services at all hours day and night. Union Utterances. (Correspondence of The Ledger.) Union S. C., Dec. 5.—Schools are open throughout the county. Nearly all began on the 28th. The attend ance is likely to be small compared with that of previous years, owing to deficiency of means. Never has there been so great a demand for books aside from other necessities destined for the children’s comfort. We as sume not the attitude of dictating to the General Assembly, but a long step in the right direction would be made if somejway was provided for the needy to be supplied with books to be used in the primary schools, modified by a compulsory educational clause. More real benefit would be derived from the public funds. Teo- ple are never ready for school, be cause there is no compulsion. Would taxes ever be collected were the time for collection be unlimited? The good intention of the free school sys tem is retarded by each patron exer cising free and unlimited control of tne responsibility thereof. Few peo ple, by action, realize the importance of the common schools. They seem to forget that in these schools the mass of people are to receive the key of knowledge and be conxent us cir cumstances will not admit of a higher course being attained. No better safeguard can be erected around a family circle than a Christian educa tion. All business activities require an education for a substantial guide. In the business avenues of life one without an education is as a ship in mid-ocean rudderless. Each little gale of oppression effects the voyager alike. We should bear in mind “That honor and fame, from no con dition rise; act well thy part, there is where honor lies.” Mr. G. W. G. Going, of Kelton, S. C., will soon have completed a large brick building which will add one more merchant to the list here. There is always some cotton in the field during the holidays regardless to the weather, price or amount pro duced. The same case is likely to prevail with some farmers this sea son. There is yet an ample, supply of the fleecy white to be picked. The Union Oil Company has gin ned about 1500 bales this season. Convenient accommodation in duced many to haul cotton a long distance. Union has fifty white and forty- five colored schools. With each of these supplied with a competent teacher sustained by the proper sup port of the parents and all concerned, ignorance may find more pleasant re creation in another clime. Ledger Reader, • - -«•»- •— —- Don’t think the man who is al ways on the run wins the most of life’s races. A Clever Trick. It certainly looks like it, but there is really no trick about it. Anybody can try it who has Lame Back and Weak Kidneys, Malaria or nervous troubles. Wo mean he can cure himself right away by taking Electric Bitters. This medicine tones up the whole system, acts as a stimulant to the Liver and Kidneys, is a blood pu rifier and nerve tonic. It cures Con stipation, Headache, Fainting Spells, Sleeplessness and elancholy, it is purely vegetable, a mild laxative, and restores the system to its natural vigor. Try Electric Bitters and be convinced that they are a miracle worker. Every bottle guaranteed. Only 50c a bottle at the DuTre Drug Co. — When some men can’t make a liv ing at anything else they try to get a public office. -• —- —— Dr. Bull’s Cough Syrup cures any case of bronchitis, lung affection and grippe. Thysicians prescribe this reliable remedy, and druggists re commend it; because it never fails to cure, and costs but 25 cents a bot tle. —- - •• -*•*- •— —. A new leather trust has just been formed, and yet people say that cor porations and trusts have no soles. — - *%•*- —. The sooner a cough or cold is cured without harm to the.sufferer the bet ter. Lingering colds are dangerous. Hacking cough is distressing. One Minute Cough Cure quickly cures it. Why suffer when such a cough cure is within reach? It is pleasant to the taste. Cherokee Drug Company, Gaffney. R. S5. Withers & Co., Blacksburg. The most truthful man in the world will lie when a woman asks him how he likes her new hat. Dr. M. A. 8iinmons Liver Medibine has since 1840 steadily risen in public favor, and the demand for it far ex ceeds that of any other Liver Medi cine. Be careful of your thoughts, for they are liable to break into words at any time. Tains in Head, Neck, Shoulders, Buck, Front, Sides, Hips and Limbs aro readily cured by Simmons Squaw Vino Wine or Tablets. THE GOVERNOR’S LENIENCY. he respites condemned YORK NEGROES. The Sage of Etta Jane Talks of People and Things—Some People af fected With Touchi ness—Notes. CCorrespondenco of The Ledger.) Etta Jane, Dec. 5.—The action of Governor Ellerbe in respiting (until January 6th,) those condemned ne groes who were to be hanged at Yorkville last Friday, Dec. 2nd, is highly commendable in the Chief Executive of our State; and the cir cumstances which led him to tfiis action are without a parallel. The enormity ot the crime for which they were convicted and sentenced (the killing of Ben Gore and putting him in an old well) was so revoltin'; to their race that even their ministers took very little, if any interest in helping them to make preparation for death. This led Rev. W. G. Ne ville, of the Tresbyterian church, and some others to take an interest an the condemned negroes and think ing that they had not had sufficient time to prepare for their awful doom, got up a petition to the Governor asking for a stay of sentence until sometime in January. The follow ing is an extract from the reprieve: “Whereas, at a court of general sessions and common pleas begun and holden in York county, at No vember term, IS!)S, before Judge Gage, one Amzi Dunnovant and Frank Castles weroj convicted of murder and were sentenced to he hanged, Now know ye that for divers good causes and considerations me hereunto moving, I have thought fit to respite and by these presents do respite the sentences of the said Amzi Dunnovant and Frank Castles until January 6th, 1898.” How beautifully does the poet Taalmist describe God’s mercy on guilty wretches in the following lines: “Be from His holy place looked down; •■The earth he viewed, from lleavtoi on high; “To hear the prisoner's moaning groan, “And free them that are doomed to die." Whatever mistakes the Governor may have made (and he is only mor tal man) is abundantly offset in this act of humanitarian consideration for these poor deluded negroes. Mr. Sam W. Foster answers query No. 2, as propounded to “Student” last week, (see Eccl 10:20.) Joe Colcock and Aleck Banks sent correct answers to our grammar question of two weeks ago. We should say : “Tass that molasses.” We don’t want our boys and girls who have taken such an interest in our questions and shown such an ap preciations of our humble efforts to interest them in school studies to think we want to biufl them by ask ing such questions as we give “Stu dent” last week. He seemed to have such a store of “high larnin” (as The Lodger might call it) that we con cluded to measure him up, or make the attempt. Hope to hear from him again. Multiply the following numbers and giv» their product:—7x8x5ix2xOx 5x6x. Who will send the first an swer? In answering “Students” quesr tions last week, we got our Geography a little mixed up and said, Cape Des olution was on the northern coast of British America instead of southern coast of Greenland. This was no fault of the printer. It was ours in toto, and we did not notice it in time to make the correction. Mrs. Carrie Inman and her daught ers, Misses Sudie May and Ora, visi ted us last Thursday. Mr. Smith Wood, of Spartanburg, was in this section last week looking after his farming interest in Chero kee. Sam Strain had a tooth pulled last Thursday that gave him considera ble pain for a day or two. We were perhaps, a little previous last week in speaking, of our teach ers in Gowdeysville township for this season. But we thought our infor mation was correct. Some of the schools we learn have have not de cided on their teachers yet. The rise in the price of cotton last week set the farmers to “humping” themselves getting it ready for mar ket. We have had an exceptionably wet year since last June; so much so, that the ground continues too wet to sow wheat or do any other p'owing. Only a few farmers have had their stubie lands turned as yet. Mr. Lewis Laurilor, of Star Farm, was down to see us week. Mr. James G. Garner has showed us a cotton stalk from which he has picked 211 fully matured bolls. The cotton weighed 24 pounds. This stalk Is of the “big boll” variety and grew on his farm at Thomson’s mill. The distance between it and the other stalks on each side was about three feet. The rows were of usual width. Mr. T. Jeff Hughes, of Gowdeys ville, paid us a visit last Friday. One who knows what she is talking about says that in grating a nutmeg, always start at the blossom end, be cause it will grate much easier. Brother “Cumtux” has our thanks for telling us where “Bug river” is. We found one over in Russia of that name, about the size of the Congaree at Columbia. It empties into the Black sea. But as he has caught the American idea, we say go up head, Brother. Those who marry old people in the hope that they will soon bury them, hang themselves in hope that some body will run and cut the rope. The farm should be a home—not a place to live at to-day and leave to morrow, but a home to he improved and beautified—a home where or chards are to be planted, where vines are to be grown, where substantial things are to be constructed, where children are to be born and parents are to die. A student once asked the president of a college if ho could not be per mitted to take a shorter course of study. “Oh yes,” replied the presi dent, “but that depends upon what you want to make of yourself. When God wants to make a giant oak to defy storms he takes a hundred years, but when he wants to make a mush room he takes only one night”. The geography of character is a branch sure to be taught some day in our public schools. The minister who fulfills his office is the one who tries to save sinners rather than to “soft soap” saints. The rain came again last Friday night and put a stop to farm work again. Our people hud just begun to sow wheat. When boys and girls can afford to insult, disobey and disgrace their parents they need not be offended when their neighbors say hard things of them. The new year will be here in a few weeks, and the results of this year will bo counted up and the balance sheets will show our use or abuse of its opportunities. Some people aro so uffiicted with “touchiness” that it won’t do to “cross” them. No amount of apol ogy, however sincere, can appease their wrath. They exact of their fellow men “absolute perfection.” If from such people we could extract their self-conceit, ignorance and gen eral “cussedness” nothing corporeal would remain but their good opinions of themselves and the contempt of their neighbors. If such people wore to dictate a short epitaph to he in scribed upon their tombstones when they are dead it would be—“Ferfec- tion absolutely perfected.” How well did Solomon understand the frailties of human nature when he said: “Let a bear robbed of her whelps meet a man, rather than a fool in his folly.” On and after the 12th instant the schedule on mail route from Gaffney to this place will be run daily as fol lows: From Gaffney by Lawn, Pine- grove, Wilkinsville to Etta Jane, and returning by Abingdon, Mercer and Lawn to Gaffney. Miss Emily Barkhead has rented the house and farm of Mr. John R. Millwood at Star Farm for next year. Mr. and Mrs. Bowen expect to move to Georgia this winter. Mrs. Bowen is the daughter of our esteem ed comrade—T. Jeff Hughes, and is an excellent lady. We wish for her and her life-partner a long, happy and prosperous life in the Empire State. Mr. Bowcu is a native Geor gian. “Moot,” the oldest son of Wylie Edwards, colored, died last Saturday with pneumonia. We have a little sonnet, the title of which is: “Danger near the coast,” which we think we will pub lish sometime before long for the benefit of our young readers. It is an appeal to individuals, particularly young people, who think they can tempt temptation and not fall a vic tim to it. There is no earthly poseession in which man may pride himself in more than in a pure, noble, clean life. It is only while the crown of purity is on his brow that man can pride himself in an exalted, noble manhood. Fortune and wealth may not have favored him. He may be little and unknown in man’s sight, but with a pure, clean record, a beau tiful character, he is one of God’s noblemen. Of John Milton it is said that while he was a member of the English legation to Italy allurements and temptations were thrown in his way, and though no man saw him he calls upon God to witness that ho kept himself pure. Daniel Webster never allowed anything indelicate or pro fane in the stories to which he lis tened. and under no circumstances was he known to utter any language which might not be repeated in the presence of the most refined ladies. Robert E. Lie and Stonewall Jackson were both men of great personal charms, and favorite guests in the most brilliant circles of society, yet neither of them ever deviated from the path of Spartan rectitude or vir gin purity. No man who prizes noble manhood should think that he ought to ex plore the dark ways that lead to “death and hell.” That idea of a double standard of morals which allows men to indulge themselves in vicious practices while expecting a white and stainless life f;om their sisters, is delusive and full of mischief. All honor to the noble women who are pressing home the truth. “If chastity is the law for the women, it must be for every wo man without exception, and if it is a law for every woman, it follows nec essarily that it must be the law for every man.” Notice the contrast between a life of spotless purity for three score years and ten and that of the profli gate Byron who at about the age of thirty,five or thirty-six wrote: "My (l:iys are as the yellow leaf. _ The (lowers anil fruits of lore are gone, Tiie worm, the canker unil the grief . Are mine, ami mine alone.” J. I.. S. Public Sales Monday. Clerk’s Sales.—J. N. Cudd vs. J. T. White 81 acres, of land in White PlainsiTownship, sold to J. N. Cudd for $445.00. Sheriff’s Sales.—Hart it Hart, E. A. Trescott, et al. vs. M. It. Reese, property in Blacksburg. Lot No. 1, bought by Mrs. Jennie Roberts for $76.00, lot No. 2, bought by Mrs. Jennie Roberts for $625.00, lot No. 3, bought by Muj. J. F. Hart for $100.00, lot No. 4, bought by Ira Hardin for $17.00, lot No. 5, bought by T. B. Butler for $27.01), lot No, 6, bought by J. F Hart for $19.00, lot No. 7, bought J. F. Hart for $380.00. John Service vs. Vinson Blanton, dec’d., lot No. 1, 98 acres of land in Draytonville Township, bough by T. H. Littlejohn for $296.00. Jot No. 2, 90 acres, bought by John O. Tate for $276.00. The James K. Goode lands, 235 acres, advertised by Miss Jane C. Nott, executrix, was sold to James W. Smith for $1,400.00. All the other cases in which lands were advertised for sale were settled before salesday. Illicit Manufacturing. (Correspondence of The Ledger.) Blacksburg, S. C., Dec. 6.—The illicit manufacture and sale of whis key in this section for the past twelve months has been carried to a point where it had become a nuisance, and and the Government authorities were requested to place an officer here. In compliance with that request Deputy Marshall A. G. Smith, an old and ex perienced officer, was placed here. Day and night he has been at work, with the result that several will have to stand trial at the next term of Uni ted States Court at Greenville for blockading and retailing. Last night Mr. Smith, in company with Messrs. Duncan and Duff, cut up an illicit distillery near this place. When the officers reached the place a tire was under the still but no one was to be seen. The cap, still, worm, two suits of overalls, and a number of other things, including a quantity of meal, were brought to Blacksburg and placed in charge of U. S. Commisioner Trescott to await the arrival of the Deputy Collector. The still is an unusually large one, being of about 125 gallons capacity. k. a. t. The Land We Live In. The following paragraphs is going the rounds of the press, credited to “Exchange,” the one paper in the world that can boast a larger circula tion than the War Cry: “We live in a land of high moun tains and high taxes, low valleys and low wages, big crooked rivers and big crooked statesmen, big lakes, big strides, big drunks, big pumpkins, big men with big pupkin heads, silver • streams that gambol in the mountains and pious politicians who gamble in the night, roaring cataracts and roaring orators, fast trains, fast horses, fast young men, and girls fast, faster, fastest, sharp lawyers, sharp financiers and sharp-toed shoes, noisy children, fertile plains that lie like a sheet of water, and thousands of newspapers that lie like thunder, and these thousands of newspapers have thousands of delinquent sub scribers who lie like the d—1 and won’t pay a d—d cent!” If you feel Dull, Languid. Broken- Down, Debilitated, have Weak Stom ach or Indigestion, use Dr. M. A. Simmons Liver Medicine. Don’t wait until the good things of life get by before looking after them. A cough is not like a fever. It does not have to run a certain course. Cure it quickly and effectually with One Minute Cough Cure, the best remedy for all ages and for the most severe cases. We recommend it bo- cuusg it’s good. Cherokee Drug Company, Gaffney. K. S. Withers ife Co., Bluckburg. •— ^ There’s nothing that bores a man who is in love more than a crowd. — •— —. Cure Stomach Troubles, Cold Feet and Hands, Excessive Menstrual Flow, with Simmons Squaw Vine Wine or Tablets.