CHARLOTTE MESSENGER.
VOL. I. NO. 8.
The New Moon.
O fair young crescent, traced in flame.
Upon the western sky,
I meet you face to face, and claim
Your happy augury.
Good fortune while you wax and wane,
. A myth of childish lore
My heart still keeps ; to-night I fain
Would be a child once more.
Along the gray horizon’s rim
Lie clouds as black as night,
While brightening through the twilight dim
Gleams out your arc of light.
O Moon ! not vain meiliinks we hold
Your promise, for we know
Your shadowed disk’s half ring of gold
With full-orbed light shall glow.
And as, 0 Moon, your silent call
Tho great sea tidos doth draw,
Life’s tidal waters rise and fail
Obedient to their law.
Why should I doubt or fear ? One Hand
Alone doth hold and guide,
And so upon the shore as!rand
I wait the incoming tide.
TOM’S EXPERIENCE.
"One of these affairs, yon know,
tilted over the face jnst sufficiently to
throw a most becoming shadow
over the eyes, making them look like
violet) on a shady bank ; and golden
brown hair, sir, streaming on the wind ;
and such an innocent baby-face, like
one of Raphael’s chernbs I Jove ! a girl
worth looking after, I assure yon!"
The weather was too warm to do more
than stare languidly at Tom’s excited
countenance ; but, fortunately he was
too much interested in his theme to be
as exigesnt as he generally is, so be
accepted the stare as sufficient token of
interest on the part of his attached
friend—myeelf—and straightway pro
ceeded :
"Shb’s with an old lady in a brown
front and spectacles, and a set of teeth
—false, you know—and no one knows
who they are ; and she walks on the
sands every morning quite early, with
out the lady with the front, and as snre
as my name's Tom Litimer, I’ll manage
an introduction.”
Here I fonnd energy sufficient to say,
"What abont Qodine ?” in a tone replete
with that elegant sarcasm for which I
am noted, bnt which, curiously enough,
Tom never appreciates as it deserves.
He now obliged the company—myself
and a lemon cob red setter—with one or
two forcible, though inelegant, expres
sions, bearing reference firstly to me,
and secondly to Godine. Godine was
the last damsel to whom he had whis
pered vows ts love.
The weather, as I have said, was ex
cessively warm, and Tom is extremely
tall, with well-developed biceps, so the
resentment which, under the circum
stances, I might have cherished was
wanting ; and with the eye of an injured
yet forgiving friend, I watched him as
he stalked to the mirrorand commenced
a critical examination of his Grecian
features and elaborate necktio, ah oper
ation he spent fully son minutes in.
Then, uhlßtliDg to the lemon-colored
setter, and arming himself with his cane
and gloves, and without so much as
deigning a glance toward my lounging
chair, be made his exit from the apart
ment, leaving me to the enjoyment of
my dolce far niente, disturbed by no
visions of violet eyes and golden hair,
or, in fact, anything bnt a pleasing
yet melancholy remembrance of the
canvas backed dneks and chablis I had
partaken of that day at my dinner;
melancholy, for do we not feel regret
for the good that is passed ?
I am not of an active habit of body,
but I am ’the fortunate possessor of
that j9wel, rare at my time of life —a
goed appetite-to retain which I court
the morning breezes before breakfast;
and it was during my constitutional the
following day that I next oaugbt sight
of Tom, the lemon-colored setter and
the necktie, and at the same time'of a
shepherdess bat. a floating cloud of
golden hair, a pair of bine eyes, and the
whitest, fattest and wooliest poodle it
has ever been n y fate to see.
The shepherdess hat was leading the
poodle by a bine ribbon with one hand,
while the other held a book, on the
page* of which the bine eyes were down
cast, of course utterly unconscious of
Tom, who was walking some twenty
yards behind, diligently sucking the
handle of bis cane, and as diligently
staring at a back view of the shepherd
ess hat-black, trimmed with crimson
roses—the golden hair and the daintiest
little waist, ronnd which a blue moire
belt was ever fastened, and the neatest
foot ever buttoned up in a kid bottine.
with mother-of-pearl bnttons.
It is needless to say that, as the hat
was absorbed in her book, and Tom in
the contemplation of the fair student,
neither of them observed me; and,
knowing from experience bow condu
cive to a hearty appetite a little mild ex-
CHARLOTTE, MECKLENBURG CO., N. C., AUGUST 12, 1882.
citement is, I slipped behind a conven
ient rock, in order to watch Tom’s pro
ceedings at my leisure.
They sanntered quietly on for a few
paces further, and this little tale might
never have been indited by my gracefnl
pen had it not been for Tom’s lemon
colored setter.
This sagacious animal had been for
sometime eyeing the apoplectio poodle
waddling on in front with divers signs
of canine ill-will, unobserved by his
spellbonnd owner, and just as its fair
mistress turned a fresh leaf of her book,
xfrith a bloodthirsty snarl the setter
dashed at the unoffending poodle, whose
white curls were soon flying in every
direction, as with yelps of defiance and
anguish, they rolled over and over in
the soft sand in deadly combat.
The young lady screamed frantioally.
and endeavored to rescue her favorite
from the fangs of the setter by shower
ing blows of her white and gold ‘ ‘Dante’’
on his yellow baok; and at this crisis
Tom sprang to the rescue with nplifted
cane and excited mian, and managed to
ci nvey to the setter, per cane and boot
coe, his desire that hostilities should
tease; and, with fervent apologies for
the unpolished behavior of his canine
follower, he placed the gasping poodle
in the little gauntleted hands stretched
eagerly to receive him. And what com
miseration the abominable hypocrite
showered on the brute, and didn’t they
eventually walk off together to her
hotel, he carrying the animal and she
chatting to him gayly and looking np
into bis face with such pretty gratitude,
while the lemon-colored setter, with
drooping ears and tail, followed slowly
in the rear.
Well, Tom came home to mock at the
idea of breakfast and rave of Bertha
Seldon—for suoh proved to be the lady’s
name—and against the charming Godine
Haughton, who sat opposite him at
table, and whose black eyes darted
reproachful fires at him across the
tablecloth; for had he not neglected to
ask her for one dance even on the pre
vious night 1
-Friendship should never blind ns to
the failings of onr friends, and I set
down with melancholy regret that Tom
was a notorious flirt. Really, I fell un
easy when I Baw the way he went on
with that little girl; and if it had not
been for a habit he had of resenting
what he was pleased to term “imperti
nent intrusion,” I’d have given him a
piece of my mind.
But it was not long before be awoke
to a discovery which astonished himself
as mnch as it did me—viz., that he had
a heart, and that it was in the posses
sion of the pretty Bertha—a fact he
determined to let her know as speedily
as possible.
“Ton see,” he said to me, “though
my father is unwise unough to contem
plate marrying again at his time of life,
I’m quite independent; and, as I’m
tolerably snre she likeß me, why, old
boy, yon may expect an invitation to
my wedding before long.”
And be swaggered off, looking like a
handsome, confident puppy as he was.
There 1 the fellow provoked me,
though I was glad he really intended
marrying the pretty, tue-eyed child,
and not jilting her, as :: X had half a
score of others.
The very same day who should arrive
at our hotel but Latimer pere, a hale,
handsome man of middle age, and an
old acquaintance of mine.
We dined together in private, and we
elders gossiped of the plaoe, the people
and the cooking, though more than once
I fancied that cheerful Mr. Latimer was
more distrait than usual, and several
times I noticed that he east anxious
glances at Tom’s thoughtful counte
nance.
“By-tbe-way,” he said, after the
waiter had placed the dessert and finally
withdrawn, “neither of yon has inquired
my bnsiness here.”
He looked at Tom, and Tom. rousing
himself, looked at him.
“Well, sir,” said that young gentle
man, "people don’t come to Newport
on bnsiness—at least, not generally—so
it didn’t strike me to inquire.”
“Well, my boy,” said the elder gen
tleman, laughing, "I’ll give you the
information gratuitously. I have come
down here for a day to see the lady I
am about to marry—Miss Beldon. You
have probably met her.”
Tom and I stand at his father in un
mitigated ‘.surprise, and Tom ejacu
lated :
"I say father, you're not in earnest,
yon know.”
"Os course I am," replied Mr.
Latimer, rising and laughing; “and I’m
off now to pay my reapeots. Gome
over in the oonrse of the evening, both
of yon.
And while Tom stared blankly after
him, be went away.
Tom looked at me and I looked at
him. Tom thrust his hands through
hia yellow curls and then into hia
trousers-pcokets. He then whistled—l
whistled.
"Back a man as that to marry a
brown front and a set of false teeth I”
ejaculated Tom. "Jove I sir, I’m struck
dumb I”
In proof of which he became slightly
profane.
Ido not approve of strong language
—I do of heck ; bo to immolate two
birds with the same stone, I cried :
“In any oase let ns drink her health.”
After which cheerful resignation oame
to Tom, and he was good enough to
say :
“Well, after all, it will be pleasanter
for Bertha and myself than if the
governor had had better taste. ]
wonder what enchantments the old
Girce threw aronnd him ?”
• ••***
“I’ll tell you what,” said Tom, as,
later in the evening, we ascended to
the drawing-room of the bride elect
and her lovely niece, “I’ll get Bertha
ont for a stroll this lovely moonlight
night, and as snre as fate I’ll propose.
It is just the evening for that kind of
thing, especially with those tender,
blue-eved things. I say, hadn't we
better knock, lest we might interrupt
the love-making.”
But I had opened the door, aud there
was nothing for it but to advance.
Th t room was but dimly lighted, yet
sufficiently so to show Miss Seldon, tho
aunt, seated in a distant armohair,
spectacles on nose, the paper she had
been pernsing fallen on her lap, while
a gentle sound, like the snorq of a fay,
proclaimed that she was wrapped in
slumber, as was also the poodle lying
at her fpet.
Close to the piano stood Mr. Latimer,
bending tenderly over a little sylph in
white tnlle; whose bright hair floated
over his blaok coataleeve, and whose
white fingers were shyly twisting one
of the bnttons of said ooat—Bertha, in
fact.
They started as the door opened, and
Bertha wonld have sprung away, but
his encircling arm detained her.
“Here, Tom 1” he called out, "come
and pay your respects to your future
stepmother. She is but a little body,
but no doubt she’ll make you a good
one.”
“Good evening Tom,” said Bertha,
smiling half-sbyly. “Why didn’t you
tell me before that yon were going to
be my stepson ? You are so nice and
kind, I love you already, and I’m sure
we’U get on so well together I”
Nice and kind I Oh, Tom, my poor
friend!
* * « )t * #
The last time I heard of Tom he was
safely landed by the skillful and inde
fatigable Godine, and they were spend
ing the honeymoon in Paris.
Mrs. Latimer, his stepmother, is a
most charming little person, and they
certainly do give the most recherche
dinners in town.
Seme Blunders In Print.
An absurd blonder appeared in the
Parliamentary report of the Daily Tele
graph on the oocasion of Mr. Gladstone’s
resolutions on the Eastern policy of
Lord Beaconsfield’s Government. There
a right honorable gentleman was repre
sented as acconnting for the action of
another member of tho House by the
statement that he had “sat at the feet
of the Gamebird of Birmingban,” an
allusion to his perception which was
not so intelligible as the rendering of
other journals, "the Gamaliel of Bir
mingham." Perhaps Irish reporters,
owing to the recognized tendency of
the soil and climate, are privileged in
matters of this kind. One of them, in
describing the result of a reoent con
flict between the police and the people
in which fire-arms were used, writes:
‘‘ln the Union Infirmary lies John
Smith with his shattered leg, which was
amputated on Tuesday last.” Ordinary
mortals might have imagined that the
surgeon wonld have caused the shatter
ed member to be removed from, the im
mediate vicinity of the crippled patient.
That Ireland has a strict monopoly of
this olask of composition can hardly be
sustained if this be oorreotly credited
to a Glasgow paper's account of ship
ping disaster: “The captain swam
ashore, as did also the stewardess. She
was insured for £3,000, and carried 200
tons of pig-iron." Bnt less ephemeral
publications than newspapers have oc
casionally furnished instances of ludi
crous ambiguity. Morse's old geography,
for example, pointed ont an architec
tural peculiarity of an extraordinary
character when it informed the rising
generation of its time thst a certain
town contained “400 houses and 4.000
inhabitants all standing with their
gable ends to the street."—[All the
Year Ronnd.
Photographs of the king of Zulnland
represent him u of melanoholy counte
nance, snch se very fat men nenally
wear in hot weather. He leans baok, as
if exhausted, in a cane chair of formida
ble proportions. It is said, however,
that this is not hie usual expression,
and when in eonverse his visage lights
up with eager earnestness.
FOR THE FAIR SEX.
Fmillion Nolen.
Waists grow longer.
Plneh is the trimming for the next
season.
Yellow maintains its sway as a favor
ite color.
Mountain suits and fatigue ooetumes
are very short.
Chenille bids fair to have a long run
of popular favor.
Enameled jewelry seems to be gain
ing ground again.
Lonis XV. dresses are in high favor
for garden parlies.
The fashion of bouffant sleeves for
full dress is gaining.
Very few first-class sooiety women of
New York wear tonrnures.
Plain mall dresses are made effective
by flonneee and trimmings of polka
dotted embroidery.
Balbriggan stookings abound in vari
ous tints of red, old gold, amber and
blue in all the new shades.
White scarfs of crinkled silk Japanese
crape are worn aronnd the neck instead
of the white. Spanish lace used last
summer.
White clematis, lilacs or geraniums
form the crown of dressy lace bonnets,
aud there are entire bonnets made of
these small flowers.
Daisy pompons, very small and
fluffy, are made of white silk for trim
ming the turbans .of velvet and straw so
fashionable this season.
The small pelerine that has one fiohn
end caught up to the left shoulder and
fastened there by a bow is in great
favor with summer dresses.
It is proposed that ladies shall adopt
the Turkish style of wearing their veils
next winter—that is, over the month,
ohin and nose instead of the eyes.
A very effective, dressy costume is
made by wearing a dressy polonaise of
small bine surah trimmed with cuffe,
plastrons and eollar of out work, and
ruffles of Moresque lace over a ekirt of
shepherd-checked taffeta in blue and
white.
Wkat a Country Girl Can Do.
“ What can a country girl do to earn
money at home?” There are ten things
the average country girl can do to earn
money—as follows:
1. Let her turn her attention to silk
culture.
2. If her neighborhood offers an
opportunity, let her open a kinder
garten school, or let her establish a
home for the taking care of yonng chil
dren when the mothers are otherwise
employed.
3. Let her can fruit. This will make
it necessary that she should have a
garden.
4. Let her run a poultry yard. Eggs,
chickens and feathers are all profit
able.
5. Let her raise honey. This is not
a bard or nnwomanly occupation. It
requires intelligence, as all occupa
tions do.
6 Let her raise strawberries.
7. Let her raise flowers. This is a
most profitable industry. Ohoioe flow
ers, wreaths lor weddings and funerals,
evergreens for publio occasions, all
command a good price.
8. Let her prepare Christmas ever
greens.
9. Let her, like her grandmothers,
make bntter and cheese.
10. Let her make jellies and preserves
[or tho market.
These ten suggestions may be of ser
vice to some country girl who is look
ing towards the oity for employment,
and she wonld become more intelligent
and more useful, more healthy, and
make a better marriage by remaining at
home.
Gained Forty Founds in. Ten Days.
A well-authenticated oase was re
ported at the Aoademy of Medioine in
Richmond, of a man in good health
who visited one of onr summer resorts
lately and fattened four pounds a day
for ten days. His weight, in round
numbers, on leaving Richmond waa 160,
and on returning ten days weighed (in
the scales) 200 pounds. This was re
garded by the doctors present as a most
remarkable result. In case, of ounval
esoence from protracted disease patients
fatten very rapidly, bnt one pound a day
nnder these circumstances is regarded
as most gratifying. It is thought, and
was stated on the oocasion referred to,
that to fatten fonr pounds daily a man
wonld have to make six or eight pints
of blood daily. This wonld bo “heavy
feeding," and from information got from
the snbjeot of this notioe the amount
consumed wss enormous. He took a
bath morning and night.
Save your old flour barrels. They
will eaoh bold jas( 678,000 silver
dollars.
W.C. SMITH, Publisher.
Summer Time.
The fragrance of the wild rase fills.
With odorous breath, the sunnier air.
And song of robin clearly trills
Along the dusty thoroughfare.
The graeey lane with olover sweet,
That leads beyond the maple’s shade.
Invites the wanderer’s lingering feet
Along the path the herd have made. _
The elope whereon the white limbs graze
Is brightened by the morning can.
That o’er the landscape softly clays,
And gilds the day bnt jnst began.
The rastio bridge serose the stream
Looks picture-like. There oft is heard
The heavy tramping! of a team,
Or the light carol of a bird.
All nature throbs with its delights,
And that has speech which once teemed
dumb;
Bweet harmony the ear iUTites,
From whispering grass to ineeet's hnm.
ITEMS OF IXTERKJiT.
Prussia has 18,000,000 Protestants and
half as many Roman Catholics, and the
government gives about 8500,000 a year
to eaoh of the two charohes.
There are in Ohio 17,274 more boys
than girls within the ogee prescribed
for attendance in the pnblio schools,
the total number of boys being 362,835.
When the German empress travels in
summer the roof of her railroad car
riage is covered with a layer of turf,
which is watered frequently during the
day as a device to keep her cool.
The French government has offered
for the second time a prize of SIO,OOO
for the invention of the most useful ap
plication of the voltaio pile. During
five years this remains open to com
petitors.
Bartholdi, designer of the statne of
“Liberty Enlightening the World,” to
be place'd in New York harbor, is a man
of great wealth, and has given $20,000
of his own fortune to defray the expen
ses of constructing the hngh monument.
There is great joy at the re-establish
ment of the drum in the French army.
In the barracks and canteens soldiers
are preparing to weloome it back with
festivity. The army, it was fonnd, waa
losing prestige in the eyes of the people
for want of the drum.
The great bell of Moscow is the
largest in the world. It is twenty-one
feet high, sixty-eight feet in circumfer
ence at the bottom, twenty-three inehes
thiok at its strongest part, and weighs
443,772 pounds. It was never hang,
but stands at the foot of Kremlin, prob
ably in the very spot where it was cast
A policeman was shot while on duty
at Fargo, Dakota. Before dying, he
said that the bullet came from the resi
dence of Jack Knudaon, a bad charac
ter. A mob hunted Knudson all night,
and would have hanged an innooent
man if they had fonnd him. bnt in; the
morning a woman explained that it was
she who fired on the offloer, mistaking
him tor a burglar.
For infants’ dresses are embroidery
patterns manufactured in imitation of
Venetian point of every color. A
dainty robe is made of cream-colored
ereponne, finished by a deep flounoe of
baby-bine satin, completely covered
with a flounce of pale bine Venetian
point lace. With unbleached fabrics
ficelle or pack thread lace in Venetian
designs is much nsed—a trimming
which is now considered the height of
eleganoe.
HUMOROUS.
“Pulverized meat” it what the Bel
gian government is about to give out
for army rations. This most be Bnlgiait
for "hash.”
“Yon write a beautiful hand. I wish
that I had suoh a hand,” said Mr.
Flasher to a lady clerk at the hotel.
“Am I to consider this as a propo* at?”
asked the bright lady. “Well—er—
yea—if my wife is wiUing to let me off.”
replied the accomplished Flasher.
A news item says that the best female
oirons rider in Russia ie Donnedretisky,
who “turns a doable somersault through
a hoop and carries her name, which is
painted in the oeatre, along with her.”
To tnrn a doable somersault through a
hoop may not bea very remarkable feat,
bnt to get her name through without
knocking off some of its oornere is oer
tain ly an astonishing performance.
Said a teacher to one of hia highest
S"iT "If yonr father gave you a
t of peaches to divide between
yourself ana your little brother, end
there were forty peaches in the basket,
after yon had taken year share what
would be left?” “My little brother
wonld be left, for I’d take all the
peaches. That's the kind of a eongress
man I’m going to be when I grow np.