THE CHARLOTTE MESSENGER. VOL. IV. NO. 8. THE Charlotte Messenger IB PUBLISHED .Every Saturday, AT CHARLOTTE, If. C. In the Interests of the Colored People of the Country. Able and well-known writers will contrib ute to its columns from different parts of the country, and it will contain thottest Gen eral Nc-ws of the day. Tits Messenger is a first-class newspaper and will not allow personal abuse in its col- It is not sectarian or partisan, but tidej-cndent—dealing fairly by all. It re serves the right to criticise the shortcomings of ell public officials— commending the ■worthy, and recommending for election such men as in its opinion are best suited to serve the interests of the people. It is intended to supply the long felt need of a newspaper to advocate the rights and defend the inter.sts of the Negro-American c--pei tally ill the Piedmont section of the Carol i nos. SUBSCRIPTIONS: (Always m Advance.) 1 year - - - *1 so months - - - 100 0 months - . 75 3months - - - ‘J months - - , Single Copy - Address, W. C. SMITH Charlotte NC‘ Printing in China. Os course, the Chinese were ahoid of Europe, says R. R. Eowkcr in Harper'e Maqacinc. Their chroniclers record printing upon silk or cotton in the cen tury before Christ, paper being attributed to the first century after Christ, It is certain that many hundred years ago they had begun to put writing on transfer paper, lay this face downwa'rd on wood or stone, rub off the impression or paste on the transparent paper, cut away the ■wood or stone, and take an impression in ink which duplicated the original First, probably, they cut the letters into the block, leaving white letters on black ground, which method, Didot thinks, was known to the Romans and was the process referred to by Pliny; afterward they cut away the block, leaving the let ters raised, to print black on white. This last process is attributed to Foong-Taou, Chinese Minister of State in the tenth cen tury, who was driven to the invention by the necessity of getting exact copies of hit official documents. Indeed, there is adetailed tradition of a Chinese Guten burg, onePi-C'hing, who, in 1041, carved cubes of porcelain paste with Chinese characters, afterward baking them, and literally “setting” the porcelain types by help of parallel wires on a plate of iron in a bed of heated resinous cement. Th< .■so types he hammered or planed even, i and pressed close together, so that when the cement hardened they were practi cally a solid black, which could be taken to pieces again by melting the cement. But i’i-Ching was born out of time, in the wrong rountry and to the wrong language. The Chinese word alphabet contains at least 80,000, possibly 240,- 000, characters (the National Printing Office at Paris made types for 4:1,000), and for the lesser number the Chinese compositor would require a large room to himself, where he could wander among 500 cases “looking for a sign,’* while (‘hinesc wood engravers will cut on jxar xvord, or on the hard waxen composition used for that oldest of existing dailies,the Pekin Gazette, an octavo page of char acters for forty or fifty cents—a hun dredth part of the cost of the coarse work, a thousandth of the cost of the finest work here. The Chinese printer, without a press, but with a double brush like a canoe paddle, inking the block w ith one end, and pressing the paper laid on the block with the dry bush at the other end, prints 2,000 sh*“ets a day, on one side only, which are then bound into a book by making the fold at the front of the sheet, and stitching through the cut edges at the back. A fair-sized book is Mild for eight or ten cents, and there is little inducement for improvement. Playing cards, invented probably in Hin dostau as a modification of chess, and then engraved on ivory, were made in j China and Hindostun centuries ago, and j thence they seem to have made their way j into Europe, probably through Baracena I or Jews, before 1400. It is claimed that Franklin and otheri have captured the lightning and lu»r nessed it in service, but a good deal of it seems to to be wandering around still in n wild state, doing a great dc*l pf dam- i »** ... I POPULAR SCIENCE. The largest guns now used on ship board are calculated to penetrate 30 inches of iron, 10 to 20 of gtanite and 75 feet of earth. The death Vate of the world is com ptatai about 67 a minute, 97,790 a day, and 35,639,835 a year, while the birth rate is 79 a minute, 100,500 a day, and 36,792,000 a year. A photographer at Pesth has succeeded in taking photographs of projectiles, fired from a Werendler gun, while hav ing a velocity of 1,300 feet per second. The projectiles appeared on the impres sions enveloped in a layer of air, hyper bolic in form. Photographic outfits are being placed on board all United States men-of-war with the purpose of illustrating de spatches. All points of value in naviga tion are to be photographed and the pictures arc to be preserved for reference at the Navy Department. Cultivated in groves, the average growth in twelve years of several va rieties of hard wood has been ascertained to be about as follows: White maple reaches 1 foot in diameter and 30 feet in height; ash, leaf maple or box elder, 1 foot in diameter and 20 feet in height; white willow, 18 inches and 40 feet ; yellow willow, 18 inches and 35 feet; Lombardy poplar. 10 inches and 40 feet; blue and white ash, 10 inches and 25 feet; black walnut aud butternut, 10 inches and 20 feet. A French savant has propounded a theory that coal was originally a liquid generated by the decomposition of infe rior vegetation in an atmospere highly charged with carbonic acid. The carbon of the jelly-like mass thus formed, after passing through various transformations into asphalt, petroleum, bitumen, etc., finally assumed the form of coal. The author cites various facts connected with the occurrence of coal, which, he thinks, are better explained on his theory than by the usual one. Dr. A. B, Griffiths, an English physi cian, has just published a communica tion which is of great importance to hor ticulturists and agriculturists. He de monstrates that iron sulphate is an anti dote for mauy of the most virulent epi demics which attuck field and garden crops. These diseases are due to micro scopic fungi, whose structures are built up in a somewhat different manner to the corresponding parts in other plants. It appears that the cellulose in these fungi is acted upon by iron bul phate, whereas in the higher plants tLe cellulose of the cell walls is not influ- ( enced. Tlic iron sulphate destroys the cellulose, but does not afTect that of the attacked plant. It is, therefore, an antidote and destroyer of such parasitic germs and fungi as the potato disease, wheat mildew, etc. During many years spent in Tunis, Colonel Roudaire surveyed four great de pressions or “shotts,” extending lx*low sea level in such a position that they may he filled with water by means of a canal. These depressions named Tedjcd, Djerid, Rharsa and Melrir—could thus be rhanged in a lake more than seventy-five feet deep, and having an area of 3,164 square miles. The creation of this lake and the consequent improvement of much surrounding country formed the favorite project of Colonel Roudaire, and now seems likely to be accomplished in spite of its author's death. The ar tesian wells tried in the district, and from which a revenue in aid of the canal was expected, are proving successful. The first well, sunk in 188 » to a depth of 295 feet, commenced yielding water at the rate of 1,760 gallons per minute, and has now increased its flow to 10,800 gal lon:! per minute. According to Sir F. de Lcsseps thcbai.ksof the river Mclah, which fifteen months ago were deserts, are now populated; and very shortly the canal will be commenced. Mr. Eugene G. Blackford, the New j York Commissioner of Fisheries, has *>een investigating the condition of the j ••yster, and his report contains much in. j teres!ing information concerning that bi%aWe. In 1800 the vast majority of : the oysters sold in the markets of this j country was from beds of oysters of nat ural growth, while to-day sixty per cent, j of the annual product of oysters is from planted beds. Os the 409,186 acres of ! land available for oyster growing but | I 15,586 acres contain oysters of natural ! growth in sufficient quantities to pay for ,t he cost of gathering them. The natuiul j growth beds of Rhode Island and Cou j necticut are practically extinct, and even the great beds of Maryland and Virginia are being rapidly exhausted. When a ringer's throat is raw, you can’t expert hersongs to he well done. j The ruby la just now the most fashion- 1 j able precious stone. j CHARLOTTE, N. C„ SATURDAY, SEPE. 3, 1887 “ SNAPPERS.” THE TOOTHSOME AND PUGNA CIOUS FRESH WATER tURTIiB. Relished as a Delicacy in Pennsyl vania— Peculiarities of the Snapping Turtle—How It is Caught. A Harrisburg (Penn.) letter to the New York Timet says: Snapping turtle soups and stews arc dishes never seen on the bills of fare of New York restaurants or hotels, and the New York free-lunch counter has not yet added them to itfc list. In Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Pitta burg, and, in fact every town on the line of the Pennsylvania Railroad in this State big enough to have a restaurant or a free lunch route, the snapping turtle, or “snapper,” as this pugnacious fresh-wa ter chelonian is locally called, is a deli cacy that is sure to draw a crowd whenever and wherever it is aerved. A peculiarity of the snapping turtle is that beneath its formidable shell are hid den 9 different kinds of meat, and every one is well flavored, tender, and juicy. The snapper does not provide stakes, like the green turtle, although it grows large enough, almost attaining in deep, slug gish waters weight of forty-five pounds, but a turtle of that size is of great age and his meat is strong and unsavory. The choice turtles are between five and ten pounds in weight. With the exception, probably, of the snapper of the waters of the southwest of the Mississippi with its three-cornered head knobby shell, and long, thick legs, covered with spiny warts, the snapping turtle is the ugliest-looking member ol chelonian family. Its head is one-quar ter the size of its body. Its jaws are hooked like the beak of a bird of -prey. Far forward on the upper jaw are set its large, prominent, yellow eyes. Its powerful scaly legs terminate in long, sharp claws, four on the front legs and three on the hind legs. Its tail is halt as long as its body, thick at the base, running to a sharp point, and crested with a saw-like row of bony scales. The shell of the snapping turtle resembles s mosaic of Egyptian hieroglyphics. When angered, which it becomes on the slightest provocation, the snapper rises erect on its powerful legs, and with its long neck extended to its full length, its tail straightened, out like a small alliga tor, and its yellow eyes glaring with fury, it approaches the object of its rage by savage jumps, drawing its neck into the shell and shooting it out again with I lightning rapidity when within striking distance. A fisherman who lands a forty-pound snapping turtle in a boat will find that he and not the turtle is caught, as the writer knows by experience. The head of a snapper of that size will weigh ten (sounds, and a man might just as well have an alligator close his mouth on him as to have the jaws of that head get a hitch somewhere on his leg. In the South the negroes call the snapping tur tle “alligator cooter.” The snapping turtle is an awkward pedestrian, lint in the water it is quick as a flash. The wary and sudden trout is no match for the great ampliibcan, and no enemy of the trout is more per sistent and destructive. The snapper lies in wait beneath the surface of ponds and streams, where aquatic fowls, es pecially goslings and ducklings, arc apt to swim, and, coming up as fleet and silent ns a shadow under the unsuspect ing prey, seizes it with one snap of his jaws, and it disappears beneath the sur face without an instant's delay. The snapper is partial to muskrats, and watches at their holes for them. If no rat appears the turtle makes his way in to flic burrow by the suhterranenn pas sage the muskrat always tunnels to his nest and seizes its game on its own thresh old. Reptiles of all kinds, especially the water snake, are a favorite morsel ! for the snapper, and fish know the turtle 1 to their sorrow. Old river hunters declare that snapping , turtles arc so wise that the moment thry I hear the sound of a gun along the water , they know some one is himting birds j that feed along the shores and in the ■ reeds and flags. Then the snapper gets itself in position to look out for wounded birds that fall into the water. If any fall they are the snapper’s meat. The snapper has its home in streams 1 and ponds. In C entral Pennsylvania it is found principally in the stream”. Every female lays not less than twenty eggs, the average number being thirty, Bhe goes some distance from the water, in tho middle of June, digs a hole in the ground directly downward, aud a foot or so deep. Then she runa a tunnel off from the aide of the hole at the bottom a I foot or so long. In that she makca her ! nest and lays her eggs, always in the I forenoon. Sometime* the lemsie snapper will dig three or four holes before she finds a place to suit her. After the eggs ntli laid she covers them and flits the hole tip with dirt, and smooths it down with gteat cart. The eggs hatch in ten days, and the little turtles at once dig their way to the surface and lose no time in getting to the water. The snapping turtle, unlike the ter rapin, is at its best during the Summer months, although it is always in demand while hibernating. The snappers bur row in the ground in November, and remain there until April. They are caught in large numbers in Cumberland, Franklin, Dauphin, Perry, Lebanon, Snyder, Schuylkill and other counties. They are fished for by men and boys, both by setting out lines in the stream, baited with meat of any kind, and by “poling” them. The snapper finds muskrat holes a favorable retreat, and ■wherever these are known to exist the fisherman knows he will find snappers. He has a long pole with a hook on the end, and, following along a stream where there are muskrat holes, ije lowers the pole down into them as he finds them, If there is a snapper there the fisherman, or hunter, rather, can tell by the contact of his pole, and he jabs his hook into the turtle and hauls it out. Sometimes the anapper will resent the intrusion of the foie by closing his jaws on it, and will old on until drawn out. In the western part of the State, near Burgettstown, is a stream called Raccoon ■Creek. It is noted for the great number of snapping turtles that abound in it. It is the only place known where hunt ing and fishing for snappers is car riel on regularly and systematically. The hunt ers have camps all along the stream. They fish with the baited cut-lme hook, aud hunt the snappers with rifles. This is done by taking a favorable position on the hank and watching up and down stream for a turtle to crawl out of the water to sun itself. A rifle ball in its head will keep the snapper out for the rest of its days. A Horse that Carries Newspapers An Indinnnpolis correspondent ol the New York Journal is respors hie for the following picturesque yarn: In this city, whereas a rule everything that goes can be seen or had, there is one novelty of which few other cities can boast. It is a horse that delivers daily to regular subscribers the Cincinnati Enquirer. This horse, the property of William Amyst, has been trained to do this work by his owner, and so thoroughly has he learned his daily route that at no time in the past six months has he for gotten one subscriber or patron. The owner himself has been the horse's instructor, and taught the sagacious ani mal to know the streets, alleys and lanes of Indianapolis and the houses of sub scribers. The horse became famous for his fast trotting, stopping promptly and in good time at every place. He knows | his business so well that when in the middle of any block where there should he the last subscriber, he will turn around, taking through an alley for a short-cut to the next patron. The novelty of this delivery of a great newspaper has made ; subscribers for it, by people who buy it because they like to sec the horse come once a day regularly and perform his re markable feat of leaving his master off at tho right house. Indianapolis, like other cities of any size, has al I competition that is wanted in the newspaper business, but when the Enquirer adopted the new system of delivery—something of an original and different idea altogether from what has ever been in vogue before —it knocked out small rivals, leaving an exclusive field for itself. It is a common thing to see a dog come to the front gate for his master’s paper; but when ahorse conics along to give it to the dog—that act supplies the missing link in the circulation of metropolitan dailies, and much doubt is expressed whether or not some other and more genial device will ever lie heard of that in all respects will supersede this mode of delivery. The horse's ability may be readily estimated when I say that he de livers to no less than 420 subscribers, scattered all over Indianapolis and the suburbs, taking over five hours to com plete the task. The memory of this noble animal is certainly wonderful. Gentle as a lamb, ho trots in 2.55 when neces sary to have the first package at the prominent news-stand of the Bates House ahead of all other dailies. So accurate is this animal in his daily course that the large sum of SBSO has been offered by sn admirer, but was refused, the horse cost ing three years ago only $75. It is estimated that the amount of money expended on new buildings this yesr throughout the Union will be more than $700,000,000. But for the labor troubles in the spring much more could have been invested in LuUding opera tions. LADIES’ COLUMN. How Ladies Count. “Did you ever notice how ladies count?” said a dry goods clerk. “I do not refer,” he continued, “to women in business, but the majority of ladies who shop. They seem to have some intui tive way of reaching results, very differ ently from the way men calculate money matters. What do I mean? Well, stand here and watch the next lady who counts her cash, and you will find that most of her arithmetic is done on her fingers. She may not snap them down ‘one, two, three ‘four,’ but there is a slight move ment of the muscles and lips that tells one that she is counting by them all the same. Some never count the money over, but accept it as right. Others count it over and always say it is short. Now you see, of those six ladies who have received change while we have been talking, only one has counted her cash, and she counted it over twice before she was satisfied. I have given this matter considerable study, and am led to infer from my observations that the average female mind has no correct sense of num bers.”—Detroit Tribune. • Her Dowry. The best, dowry a wife can bring to her husband, says the Youth’e Companion , is ft true and faithful heirt, and a sincere desire to he to him all that is expressed in that old-fashioned word, “help-meet.” The question of other dowry, such as chattels or land or money, should always he secondary, and is when marriage con tracts are made in the right spirit. A very old lady, known to the writer, amuses her friends by giving the follow ing inventory of the things contained in the dowry she brought to her husband: “In the first place,” she says, “I thought the world and all of Reuben, and so did he of me; and neither of us ever changed our minds. “Then for other dowry I had from my home, one young cow, one colt, four head of shotes, six hens, and a dominick rooster, one cat, one feather bed, six good sheets, one new brass kettle, one n arming pan, fourteen quilts and six cov erlets, six pewter spoons, six plates, four tups and sasscra, two knives and two forks, a bushel of seed corn, two chairs, ten pounds of wool and ten of flax, a glass molasses pitcher, and s pewter sugar bowl. ‘‘l tell you folks thought Reuben had done mighty well to get me in those days, and I think so, too. So did he; and lie never thought different. That’s the best part of it.” Insuring Maidens. In Denmark there is a society known as the Maiden Assurance Society; its aim is to provide for Indies of well-to-do families. It shelters and cares for them, and furnishes them with "pin money.” Its methods are thus described: Thl nobleman —for the association is peculi arly for this class—as soon as a female child is horn, enrolls her name in a cer tain association of noble families and pays a certain sum, and thereafter a fixed annual amount to the society. When she reaches the age of twenty-one, she be comes entitled to a fixed income, and to a suite of apartments in a large building of the association,with gardens and park about it, inhabited by other younger or older noble ladies who have, in like man ner, become members. If her father should die in her youth, and she should desire it, she has shelter in this building, and at a time fixed her income. When site dies or marries all this right to in come lapses, and the money paid in swells the endowment of the association. Her father may pay for twenty years and then her marriage cuts off all advantage of the insurance. But this very ehanca must enable the company to charge lower annual premiums aud make the burden less on the father insuring. He has, at any rate, the pleasant feeling that his small annual payments are insuring his daughter’s future, and giving her a com fortable home and income after he is gone. It is obvious that the chances for marriage among a given number of women can b* calculated as closely as those of death. The plan has worked well for generation* in Copenhagen.— Manehester ( England) Policy Holder. Frihion Note*. Figured black tulle over a akirt of colored silk is liked for evening weai. Many of the newest tailor-made auita have the white pique waistcoat and col lar. Numerous fancy trimminga appear upon the long wriata of the neweat gloves. Bolid silver chains for girdles or for looping up dresses are among new and novel things seen. Coarse braids are more stylish than any of finer wear for dressy hats, either in bock or in colors. . . Term $1.50 per Ain. Single Copy 5 cents. Latest Parisian bonnets are by no means as high as they were and are exceedingly simple and pretty. Light white silk, voile or muslin takes the place of heavy satin or moire for warm weather wedding dresses. Gauze ribbons are still the prettiest possible trimming for the white lace bonnets *o stylish this season. A sash bridle is stylish on either white or colored costumes and takes the place of a sash in finishing a cos tume. Honey comb work is used for the yokes of thin fabrics instead of shirring, and is attractive for washable or thin woolen fabrics. Cock’s plumes are stylish on traveling hats and for generally knock about wear, as they perfectly stand any sort of weather. A beautiful costume of striped pink silk of black and white combined with eliantilly lace is as elegant as anything seen this season. Among the newest dress trimmlDgs are metal embroidery. Gold, silver, bronzo and iridescent threads are worked by machine in beautiful deigns, and tho foundation being afterwards cut away leaves an open work pattern, gWing tho tffect of lace. A House Invaded by Rattlesnake*. Just over the line in Marion county, Georgia, a wild mountainous section of the county, a man by the name of Becker has lived for several years. Mr. Becker’s home is the ordinary one-room log cabin of that section, and his family consisted of a wife, several small children, and half a dozen dogs. The Becker homestead is located in a picturesque ravine, near a cumber of small caves, in the mountain side. Last week Mr. Becker, returning at sundown from his day’s labor, found his family some distance from the cabin clinging to each other in abject terror. The half dozen dogs lay dead in the yard, ftnd over their swollen bodies crawled and hissed hundreds of rattlesnakes. The floor of the cabin and the entire yard were covered with the poisonous reptile*. Mrs. Becker informed her husband that >arly in the afternoon several snakes irawled into the yard, coming from tho Erection of the nearest cave, which was ibout 200 yards away. These were promptly killed by the dogs, but in a ’ew minutes others came in such numbers ;hat the dogs were overpowered and stung to death by the poisonous fangs of :he reptiles. They soon began to come n still larger numbers, and several of ;hem entered the house. Mrs. Becker ind her children then fled in terror, and est the reptiles in full possession of the oremiscs. In the semi-darkness even ;he bold mountaineer did not dare st ack the hideous invaders of his house, ind carried his family tp tho house of a leighbor, where they remained during ;he night. Early in the morning Mr. Becker returned home, only to find the makes still in possession and largely re inforced. He summoned acveral of hi* neighbors, aqd the party, armed with ihotguns, returned to the cabin to ex terminate the reptiles. Volley after vol ley was fired into the writhing mass, but still snakes continued to crawl out of the brush and coil themselves in the yard or cabin. After killing snakes for an hour the party left, and the reptiles were still in possession of the cabin.— Birmingham (Ala.) Ana. Bill Nye. The New York Graphic has the follow ing sketch of Bill Nyc, the humorist, now of the World : Bill Nyc's exact age and birthplace are topics which afford considerable scope for speculation. He is certainly, how ever, under two score in point of years, and if he was not born in Wisconsin he has lived long enough at Hudson, in that State, to call it home. Somewhere in the neighborhood of eight or nine years ago Nye was a country pedagogue in one of the Northwestern counties of Colorado. Spelling-bees were all the rage at that period in his vicinity and he wrote an account of one given in his school-house and sent it to the Denver Tribune. O. H. Rothaker, who ia now publishing a splendid newspaper in Omaha, was the managing editor of the Tribune who re ceived Nye’s first humorous offering. He recognized it as a piece of good work, printed it, and secured the ambitious schoolmaster as an occasional correspond ent by placing him on the list of dead head subscriber*. Nye wrote in this manner for several months, and then concluding that funny journalism was hi* forte he removed to Laramie, Wyoming, and started the Boomerang. He made money by the venture, and eventually become the postmaster of that flourishing little city. Failing health rendered his return to Wisconsin neces sary. His recent temptations and tribu lations are too commonplace for com ment. , . .