North Carolina Newspapers

1 - ; .; ... if 5 SJ'i ITT r I 1 I I -II II Ah ANTHONY As CROSS, Editors and Publishers. TERMS: $1.25 Per Year In Advance. VOLUME I. CONCORD, N. C, SATURDAY, JANUARY 21, 1888. NUMBER 2. Comrades. One steed I have of common day, And one no lesa than regal; By day I jog on old Saddlebags, By night I fly upon Eagle; 4 To store, to market, to field, to mill, One plods with patient patter. Nor hears along the far-off heights The hoofs of his comrade clatter. To field, to market, to mill he goes, Nor sees his comrade gleaming Where he flies along the purple hills, . Nor the flame from his bridle streaming; Sees not his track, nor the sparks of fire So terribly flashing from it, As they flashed from the track of Alborak When he bravely carried Mahomet One steed, in a few short years, will rest Under the grasses yonder; The other will come there centuries hence To linger and dream and ponder; And yet both speeds are mine to-day, The immortal and the mortal; One beats alone the clods of earth, One stamps at heaven's portal. Henry Ames Blood in Century. Max Dwight's Reward. BY MRS. M. SHEFFEY-PETERS, Max Dwight was ready for his early tramp to the upland lake where, as he knew, there was a certain out-cropping of roots suited to the manufacture of some rustic benches he had been prom ising to make for his wife. Mistress Janet accompanied him to the porch of their cottage, carrying Tottie, who in her pink and white pret tincss of babyhood, was as like the young mother as the wild rose's bud is like the wild rose. 'The rain must have been heavy above here," remarked Mistress Dwight,. not ing the aspect of the creek in the Di vide. The stream, ordinarily tangled like a silver wire among the bowlders and bosky hollows at tho base of the ridge, was chafing in its bed, the acceleration of its current betrayed by a muffled roar. "Yes, when the Otter's boosting along like that, the pity is that the mill stands still, and the hands are idle," com plained Dwight. "Don't fret, Max. Td not get my benches but for the mill machinery being out of gear." He laughed, kissed her and Tottie, and a moment later was striding down the path to the bridge, whose arches connected tho jutting ridge on which he lived with the further side of the Otter. This stream, lower down, did the work of an army of giants, turning the wheels of the mills and factories, in which hun dreds of bread-winners daily toiled. Alluvial bottoms, cultivated farms, vil lage homes of peace and plenty, and countless other evidences of prosperity lay behind Dwight when he had crossed the bridge and turned into the path leading upward to the lake plateau, i Aways observant, he noticed that the creek was steadily rising. "The rain must have flushed the lake considerably," he thought, stopping once to inspect a tangled mat of drift whirling pas "Bless me 1 if that isn't a lily-pad from the lake's bed. How ever anything but a hurricane " He stopped short. A horrifying fear had throttled him in the rugged path. The morning was Jnstinct with joyousness.To, the ear came the matin symphonies of nature; to the eye her harmonies of light, color, move ment. Overhead were flockings of spelling cumuli white as fresh washed sheep browsing in a spacious pasturage of the myosotis bloom. Whence was the menace of evil? Wrestling with the Shape in the way, as Christian wrestled with Apollyon, Dwight saw, drifting by, another clump of lily-pads, tangled with a vine full of foliage and budding fruit. "It's a branch of the wild-grape that climbs the sycamore . next the lake's rim," came to him with the force of as surance, and casting aside his axe, he sped up the ascent he had been, leisurely climbing. Reaching the plateau, in the midst of whose picturcsqueness was embowered the lake, overhanging the defile like a Babylonish garden, he saw, almost to h:s chagrin, its hundreds of millions of cubic feet of water placidly smiling and dimpling in Ih s sunshine. The rain had not flushed it. Flushed? The lake was lower than its lowest water-mark! The fear he had shaken off leaped upon him and tore at his vitals again." As his gaze darted along the embank ment to the cleft through which the creek flowed, he saw that the stream was not only momentarily eating its way deeper into the rim, but that, here and there, the embankment showed fissures, indicating an extended dislodgmont of the natural supports of the lake I asin. A practical engineer himself, Dwight had always entertained a doubt of the Btability f that, freak of nature the disproportionate fountain head of Otter Creek. Soma day, ho had thought, the cray-fish, the otters, the thawing and the freezing would do their work and then would come tho drainage of the great basin. But not in his day! Oh, no! Net . when- he had just builded a home for Janet and the black-eyed Tottie right in tho shadow of the superincumbent ruin; not while the valley below was astir rith the whirr tof mills, the step pifig of busy feet along its ways of pleas antness and peace. - But it had come in his dayl As he stood staring, a fissure widened and a bold stream shot forth. At the sight he turned and fled down tho path. Nat urally, his first impulse was to fly with the warning to his wife and child jsurely no man could hold him blamable if he should bear these first to a place of safety! Yet the path by the ridge was not the direct one to the factory settlements. Should ho turn aside, there were hun dreds of lives further down to be put in periL When Jonah was sent to Nine veh what had been counted for . him in the scale against the salvation of a city of people f What if the lives of Janet and the child were more to him than the lives of the scores of neighbors and friends for whom God had commissioned him to make this sacrifice? "Is the servant better than his Lord that he should refuseto pay the price demanded for the ransom of the many?" The words were thought rather than spoken as he dashed past his home. Every muscle he was straining to the utmost, but there were those about the mills who, marking his frantic gestures, came running to learn of him what they portended. "The lake, the lake! Fly, fly!" was the half articulate cry they caught from his lips. A, wave of his hand toward the creek filling the mill wheels interpreted the direful cry. From mouth to mouth it flew. There was a hurrying to and fro, and a gathering of treasures in hot haste. Messenger! of warning galloped along the doomed valley. The weak, tho old, were seen climbing the heights. Dwight's sacrifice had not been vain; but, his duty done, he had turned back to see if, haply, he might yet save his own treasures. The torrent was leaping against, and tearing at the abutments of the bridge as he reeled across it, and with spent strength climbed the path to the cottage. Through the door he had a glimpse of Janet with the child cra dled in her arms, and above the roar of tho torrent he could hear the mother crooning her lullaby. 4 'Max, Max! Oh my. dear, what is it?" lie lay across the threshold ex hausted. She stepped past him to the porch. Below the cliff the Otter was pounding the bridge's supports. She had seen the stream as high once be fore, though. What was it Max feared? A sound reached her as she waited. The detonation, sharply distinct, came from a distance, but was immediately followed by a horrible crunching and grinding, producing a quivering in the cether about her. In the same instant, almost, she beheld, far up the Divide, a white wall rise up from earth to heaven ; it was as a cliff s escarpment, scooped and bowed over, and, ponderous as it appeared, it was bearing down the gap at terrific speed. Janet's lace blanche 1, but it was a brave smile she gave her husband as she lifted him into the room, and closed the door. . "I know what it is, Max," she whis pered as she sat down by him, with the child in her arms, and tenderly raised his head to her lap; "it will not be hard for us to brave death together." The roar stupefied their senses; the ridge shook to its foundations; the house quivered like an aspen, as a tor rent descended upon it, and a pool . of water, churned to a froth, gathered about the group. They sat still, unheed ing. What time the work of destruc tion.was wrought they knew not. Max crept to the door presently, but as he looked out he uttered a cry, and turned back to Janet. She hurried to him, and this was what they saw: a sheer precipice dropping, from their door into tho turbulent waste of waters boiling along the length and breadth of the lately smiling landscape of the Divide. "The bridge is gone, and with it the ridge has been clean .shayen away up to our very threshold, Janet, said Max, awe-stricken. "Yes, the waves and billows of destruction havj gone over us," she cried with thanksgiving of heart. - "But oh, Max, what of the poor people at the mills and in the villages?" He told her, shivering, how he had gone to them, leaving her and the little one to perish. She stood for a moment silent. "You would have perished with us at the last, though, my Max," she said, her hands in his, "only God in his goodness has left us to each other. Let us accept nis loving kindness as the re ward of your duty faithfully done. Where Pencil Wood Comes From. It is not generally known that the world's supply of pencil wood is drawn from the gulf coast swamps on both sides of Cedar Keys, and "that the pro duct of the mills there is shipped not only to New York and New Jersey fac tories, but also to Germany and, per haps, other countries of Europe. The industry gives employment to hundreds of operatives, white and black, and dis burses large sums of money. That nothing may be lost, the sawdust is dis tilled -in large retorts, and the oil ex tracted, every ounce of which finds ready sale. SHARPSHOOTING. The Experience of a Confederate Soldier in the War. How a Federal's Deadly. Rifle was Finally Silenced. In passing in and out of the lines as a scout, writes an ex-Confederate soldier in the Detroit Free Press, I saw more or less of the sharpshooters of both armies, and was twice wounded from Federal rifle-pits, but the closest and best shoot ing of the sort I ever saw was around Petersburg, At points around Petersburg, where the lines of earthworks were only pistol Bhot apart, the sharpshooter plied his rifle night and day, and they became a living terror to both sides. I was for two weeks in the Confederate works, opposite Grant's Fort Hell, and al though tons upon tons of Federal shot and shell were hurled at us, we lost more men by the bullet of the sharpshooters than by all cannonading. In the Confederate works, just above the fort which Butler blew up and which has since been known as the Crater, the most effective cannon was silenced for two days by a Federal sharpshooter who ensconced himself only a stone's throw away. I do not know that the one man held the place for two nights and two days, but we judged so from the style of firing, and because when we were finally rid of him no one else took his place. He crept out from the Federal line in a dark and rainy night, dug a rifle pit, banked up the dirt around it, and killed two of our men between daylight and sunrise. He had a sixteen-thooter rifle, and he gave all his attention to one embrasure in the fort and before noon the piece of artil lery at that embrasure was silenced. A round dozen Confederate sharp shooters were detailed to kill the fellow off, but ho would not be killed. The dirt was knocked about his ears in per fect clouds by bullets, and now and then a piece of filled artillery sent a shell plowing along over him, but he was there to stay. When night came we intended to creep out and kill or make him a prisoner, but lo! a whole company was brought up and stationed in the ravine just behind him, where their fire would sweep the field around his pit, and we had to turn to some other plan. He was there in the morn ing, and ho killed one man and wounded a second before 8 o' clock. Three pieces of light artillery played on hi pit until the guns had fired a dozen shells each, but he was unharmed. It was plain that he had dug his pit so deep and narrow that everything from our side must pass over it, and it was certain that we must try some other plan. Had he been without close support three or four men could have solved the problem pretty quick, lut there were sharp shooters by tho hundreds in his roar, and that rear so close that not a hat could show above our works without being made the target of a dozen bullets. By noon of the second day we had had four men killed and five wounded by the one Yankee sharpshooter, and the Colonel commanding had offered a $20 gold piece to anyone who would finish him off. He might have made it $20,000 for all we could do, as every body had cudgelled his brains in vain for a plan. It was about 5 o'clock in the afternoon that a corporal belonging to some field artillery stationed a mile or so above us on the lines came down to see a relative of us, .and when. the sit uation had been explained to him and he had looked over the ground he said: "Give me an hour's time and I'll have him out and win that gold piece." He returned to his command and secured half a dozen small fuse-shells belonging to a mountain howitzer which was then in park as of no account. When they were brought up he made a 6ling from the leather of a boot-leg and two stout cords and then gathered a dozen small stones to practice with. While he flung these stones one of the men timed their fall, and in this way he knew how to cut the fuses. The fifth rock, flung high in the air on a curve, as a . mortar would throw it, fell so closo to the sharpshooter's pit that the corporal was satisfied. He then cut his fuses and began throwing lighted shelL The weight of them was about thirteen ounces, and while they did not fly as high as the rocks, the curve was the same. We were nil satisfied as to what the result would be. The fourth shell dropped square into the pit and exploded as it struck, and in the cloud of dirt blown out was the sharpshooter's cap, the stock of his rifle and his canteen. Not another shot was fired from the pit, nor did any Fed eral dare occupy it again. The Way of the World. The rich woman worries herself over the subject of what she will wear at dinner her mauve silk or her garnet satin. The poor woman worries herself over the subject of what she'll make for dinner-bean soup or codfish balls. And thus the world goes on while we vainly strain our eyes looking for the coming of the millenium. B Mon Courier. Fish-Lines From Butterflies. The boys in China, as well as the beys in America, have their favorite sports and pastimes. The fishing lines used in this country are of twine, but in China they are tho product of a moth. Adele M. Field, of Swatow," China, writes to tho Swiss Cross: In some of the Chinese shops there are sold, for about one 'cent each, little coils of translucent, ' yellowish thread, from five to ten feet long. When old and .dry they are rather brittle, but when they have been soaked for ten minutes in warm water in which rice has been boiled they toughen and will bear the strain of a four or five-pound weight. They are used as fishing-liaes, and are reckoned the best for creek or coast. They are unwittingly supplied to the fishermen by a butterfly. The large and beautiful Atlas moth, with pink stripes and six glowing cre3- J cents on its brown wings, flits about and lays its eggs on the tallow trees. The eggs hatch in the sunshine, the tiny caterpillars come out and feed on the j fresh leaves, and grow to be four inches long and an inch thick. They are of a bright pale green color, with a horny black head and jaws, and with eight pairs of legs. The six .legs on the thorax are jointed, and each ends in a 'claw, while the other five pairs of legs are telescopical and end in discs sur rounded by minute hooks. The cater pillars crawl, back downward, along the leaf stems, and devour a leaf in a twinkling. When they are fullgrown . and ready to spin the c CKms In which they would wrap themselves and change into butterflies, the Chinese boys pounce upon them, slit them across the back and draw out the two spinning glands which lie looped along each side of the body cavity closo under the skin. These glands, when extended, are about three feet long and one-tenth of an inch thick, dwindling to two fine threads that unite near an orifice under the mouthy where the silk is spun out. They are full of the clear viscid substance that would be spun into the cocoon. After being drawn out whole, through the slit in the back, the glands are dropped into vinegar to remove their outer coating and are then stretched to double or treble their usual length. When dry they form the fish lines sold in the shops. Dairy Schools. Dairy schools appear to have become quite popular in Europe. They have not been tried in this country, and may not succeed as well here. But, as we recently stated, Lawson Valentine has started a dairy school on the Houghton farm. It is announced that a number of students have catered the school, and quite strong hopes are entertained of its practical success. Wo shall watch with interest for the results. There is need enough for proper instruction in dairy ing among the farmers generally. As a rule, the smaller farmers, who carry surplus butter to the village stores, are the most in need of infor mation how to turn out better goods. They are probably also tho most destitute of proper facilities for successful butter making. But it re mains to be seen how far this class can be reached through the establishment of dairy schools. They are the ones most benefitted by tho creamery, and other form? of associated dairying. If their sons and daughters can be induced to take instructions in dairy 'schools or creameries, it will not only improve the quality of farm butter, but add consid erably to the farmers' incomes. There is no reason, but ignorance, why poor butter should be made. It is just as easy, and costs no more to make good butter. Prairie Farmer. Story of a Hospital Onilt "An old Boston lawyer telis the fol lowing story: "One of my neighbors is an architect, t ill, d irk, handsome, and a little more than middle-aged. His wife is a charming woman, fair aid beautiful. The husbm I wis a private in a Massachusetts regiment during the rebellion. He was desperately wounded in an engagement, and forsever.il months afterwards was an inmate of a hospital. Upon the cot which he occupied was a quilt with the na nes of thir teen girls embroidered ' on the edge together with that of tho North ern city from which t had been sent. When the patient grew well enough he wrote a letter to cac i of the thirteen misses, thanking theni for the quilt and telling them tho story of his illness. Hj received kind replies from all of them. One of thosa letters in terested him particularly, and he kept up a correspondence with the writer for some months. On his return to the jNorth he called upon hot, and before another year passed they were married. Although twenty years have gone by since their wedding, they are still the handsomest couple lever saw. --Chicago Ledger. ' A Conundrum. "Grandpa," inquired Johnny Bliss, "must everybody die?" "Yea, my child, everyone in this world must die when his time comes." "Well" long pause "what I'd like I to know iaf who'll bury tho last man!" NATIONAL ANTHEMS. Origin of Some Leading Euro pean Compositions. Story of the Strring . French Song, "La Marseillaise." The origin of tho British national an them, says an English paper, has proved a source of uninterrupted vexation for many years past There is almost as much mystery regarding it as there used to be about the source of the Nile. The common account attributes it to Dr. Bull, King James I.'s organist, but it has. also been claimed for nenry Carey, the author of "Sally in Our Alley." Bstween these two the authorship and composition almost certainly rest, but it has been found impossible to decide defi nitely for the one or the other. Th music of "God Save the Queen" is tame and uninteresting, but it agrees well with the comparatively peaceful, regulai course of events which has marked pub lic affairs in England for over 200 years past. Not so is the national anthem of Fiance. There never was a more rous ing composition than "La Marseillaise." "The sound of it," says Carlyle, "will nuke the blood tingle in men's veins and whole armies and assemblages will sing it with eyes weeping and burning, with hearts defiant of death and des pot." It had a great share in the first French revolution, for in a few months after it was made known everyone was singing it and the words 'To arms) March!" were resoundiug in all parts of France. At every season of disorder since its strains have excited the pas sions of the people, and if immortality can be predicted for any tune known to man this is beyond a question the one. And yet, as the story goes, both words and music were the production of one right. They wero composed in 1793 by a person whom Carlyle calls "an inspired Tyrtam colonel," Rouget dc Lisle, who was still living when Carlyle's "French Revolution" was first published. The scene of its birth was Strasburg, and not Marseillaise, but it was a force of Mar seillaise which first marched to it, and hence the title. The Russinn national anthem, "God Protect the Czar," w;,s first performed at the Grand theatre, Moscow, in Decem ber, 1833. Previous to this there had been no national hymn in Russia, and the czars usually contented themselves with our " God S.ivo the King." The composer was Col. M. Lwoff, and in re turn for the composition the Czar Nicholas presented him with a gold snuff box, set with diamonds. The music is distinctly national, but the words, as every one kuows, are any thing but the actual prayer of tho Russian people; "God Save the Cz:ir! Mighty autocrat! Reign for our glory, " etc . It is, properly speaking, an official hymn, and is unknown to the vast ma jority of Russians. The Austrian national anthem is well known in England from its use as a hymn tune. It was composed by Haydn, and performed for the first time at tho celebration of the birthday of the Em peror Franz at Vienna in 1797. The lovely air is thoroughly German, and found therefore already acceptance in the hearts of the people. Haydn him self was very fond of it. He used it in the variations in one of his quartets, and when he was dying he insisted on being taken from bed to tho piano, when he played the air three times over very solemnly in the presence of his weeping servants. The Danish national anthem is not un like the "Rule Britannia." It was com posed by a German named Hartmann, about the year 1770. The "Sicilian planner's Hymn," though it can hardly be called a national anthem, is a favor ite air with the gondoliers of Venice, who sing it frequently. Japanese Cats and Dogs. Some of the animals of Japan are quite different from the same species which are seen in America. The cats, for instance,-have tho shortest kinds of tails or else none at alL Being de prived of this usual plaything, the are very solemn pussies. An American onco took one of these tailless cats to San Francisco as a curiosity, and it utterly refused companionship with the long tailed specimens there; but, finding a cat whose tail had been cut off by acci dent, the two becime frienaiy at efnee. Japanese dogs are almost destitute of noses, having the nostrils set directly in tho, head. The smaller the nose, the more valuable the breed. Papa Gave His Couscnt. "You say that you love young George Sampson," said a Chicago father to his daughter. "Yes, papa." - "And George Sampson loves you?" "Yes", papa." "Has he sufficient means to support you in your present style of living?" "Yes, pain; h;'s worth dollars where you are worth buttons." So the old gentleman gave bis con Bent. Epoch. SCIENTIFIC SCRAPS. Steamboat companies, especially those operating on tho Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, are using Electic head lights and marine projectors to a very large extent. A fish' that was pumped from a well down 100 feet, at Charlotte, Mich., is described as having been "two and a quarter inches long, with' keen bright eyes, but no fins or scales. Its back was fringed with a row of bony spikes." Astronomer Henry M. Parkhurst says he has recently discovered "a woman in the moon," and has named her Selene. Certainly the diagram of markings on the moon, which he claims to have seen, includes a ' striking suggestion of a woman's faco and bust. An Oxford meteorologist seeks to pQve that tho European and American magnetic poles are coincident with the centres of greatest cold for the two con tinents, and that the shifting of the magnetic poles is duo to the same series of astronomical and geological causes which produce the regular changes in climate. A so-called oable anchor has proven effectivo in ' stopping steamers tm the Seine. The device is duo to M. Pagan and consists of a rope bearing a num ber of canvas cones which open out like parachutes when thrown into the water. In tests made," stoppage was effected in a tenth of the space and a fourth of the time ordinarily required. At a late meeting in London, Dr. E. P. Thwing stated that Americans are more susceptible to the influence of al cohol than Englishmen, and that they are more affected by tobacco than are Hollanders, Turks or Chinese. This he supposes to be due to an increased sensi tiveness of the nervous system induced by the high pressure life of this country. A large stove consuming the same amount of coal as one of smaller size will radiate more heat, and is therefore the most economical. The reason for this is that the larger stove has more eurface, and hence when hot its effect is greater upon the surrounding air. Oi course the factor of intelligent manage ment must be taken into account with this comparison. Mr. David Drylc, curator of the Canadian Institute, has in his possession the tooth of an enormous elephant of former ages which was found by Moses Forrowman of Buffalo in the creek at Hog's Hollow after the wahout of six or seven -years' ago. This remarkable specimen is of great value, as being so far as known, tho most northerly dis covery of the remains of the elephas pnmigonius. Dr. H. Lane of Portland, Ore., be gan digging a large well some time ago and it promised to furnish an unlimited supply of cold water. Indeed the water came so fast that one pump could not keep it out of the way of the workmen, and a second was to be put in. But in one night the temperature of the water changed, and in the morning clouds of steam roiled up from tho well, which was found to contain about twenty-five feet of water almost boiling hot. At last accounts the temperature had not lowered. A Carnivorous Antelope. While visiting a friend on a cattle ranch in the San Andreas Mountains of southern New Mexico, says Ralph S. Tarrin in the Swiss Cross, I saw what to me seemed a most abnormal habit. My friend had a young antelope six or seven months old, which he had cap tured when very young, and kept as a pet about the ranch. This animal is, by the way, very tame, following its master about without once offering to join its fellows, which often come in sight of the house. When offered pieces of raw beef, it will eat the meat with evident relish, and in preference to vegetable food. I have seen it eat piece after piece until it has. disposed of half a pound or more, then it would walk to the corn-crib and eat corn as a sort of dessert. It also eats bread, cooked po. tato, and sweet-potato both raw and cooked. Curious Electric Freak. A curious freak of electricity is re ported from Cundinamarca, in Panama. A farmer had been superintending some work in the fields and had left his men to return homo, when he was surround ed by an electric flame, which disap peared as quickly as it came. The vic tim's left eye wai damaged, and the ejfbrow was burned completely off. The hair surrounding bis ears, a part of his beard, and all the hair on his breast were burned off, all the brass buttons disappeared from his clothing, his watch chain was cut in two, a small hole was bored through his watch case, and the watch glass was shattered and his right side was burned. He suffered se verely, but is recovering rapidly. Tired Enough to Sit Down. He had been out very late the night before, and it was ten o'clock when he came down to breakfast. . Husband "What makes the coffee so weak?' Wife "Because it has been standing so long." Siftings. - What I LIt For. I live for those who love me, For those I know are true, For the heaven that smiles above me, And awaits my spirit too ; For all human ties that bind me, For the task by God assigned me, For the bright hopes left behind me, And the good that I can do. I live to learn their story Who've suff er'd for roy sake, To emulate their glory, And follow intheir wake; Bards, martyrs, patriots, sages, . The noble of all ages, Whose deeds crowd history's pages. And Time's great volume make. I live to hail the season, By gifted minds foretold, When men shall live-by reason, . And not alone by gold: When man to man united , And every wrong thing righted, The whole world shall be lighted, As Eden was of old. I live to hold communion With all that is divine, To feel there is a union, Twixt nature's heart and mine. To profit by affliction, Reap truth from fields of fiction, Grow wiser from conviction, And fulfill each great design. I live! or those who love me For those who know me true For the heaven that smiles above me, And awaits my spirit too,' For the wrong that needs resistance, Tor the cause that lacks assistance. For the future in the distance, And the good that I can do. Q. Linnaeus Banks. HUMOROUS. The aeronaut's . business, it seems, is going up. Men who must draw the line some where Surveyors. A dog rarely points a moral, but he frequently adorns a tale. The successful lover thinks he is get ting ahead when he is getting a heart. A good mattress is worth 000 per cent, more at seven a. m. than it is at seven p. in. Fashions for males don't change much, still there is always a new wrinkle in coat tails. "I'll take your part," as the dog said when he robbed the cat of her portion of the dinner. There is an athletic club in Indiana composed entirely of grocers. - They are all lightweights. A man with a heart in the right place is more of a curiosity than a man with a heart in tho left place. It always bothers a Frenchman who is learning English to read one day that a murder has been committed, and the next day that the murderer has been committed. "You must take great pains to keep out of draughts," said a doctor to a pa tient. "Take great pains? I've got all ' the pains now I can exist under. .1 can keep out of draughts without taking tny more pains, was the painful reply. Pickles and Sauces. "The use of forejgn pickles and sauces in this country is very small now. " American products have taken their place." This was the reply of a wholesale New York grocer to a question -from a Mail and Express reporter. Tho reporter then asked: " Has the fame of the foreign goods died out?" "Not exactly; but tho American pickles are fully equal to th em, and, what is of more importance to consam ers, they are much cheaper. You will remember that at one time no pickle was thought worth eating unless it bore the stamp of a certain firm in London. The same may be said of sauces. But this is all changed. No on3 thinks of asking for the London concern's pickles now in any ordinary grocery store, and if anyone should it would be almost im possible to get them. The American bottle pickles are. from thirty-three to fifty per cent, cheaper to the jobbing trade, and therefore can be sold at a dower price to the consumer." "Where are the pickles prepared?" "They are grown and pickled in this State. At Montrose, N. Y., there, is a pickle factory nearly a block in extent. They are put up in quantities to suit both family and hotel use." "What about the sauces?" "The old English sauces are no longer on the price lists of large grocery stores, as a better kind can be supplied at from 40 to 50 per cent, cheaper. .That the latter gives satisfaction is shown by the fact that it has superseded the . foreign among the wholesale trade and jobbers, besides which the old prejudices against anything Amsrican has died out. If the article bo equally good, and can be had cheaper, it will command the trade." The Deadly Centipede. A centipede and a tarantula which were found in a bunch of bananas at Sacramento were placed in a glass jar logeiner to see wiiat tne result would be. They commenced fighting immedi ately. After a severe struggle the cen tipede killed his antagonist. A mouse was then placed in the jar and rolled over dea l after one bite from the centi pode.