THE' AN EXCELLENT ADVERTISING MEDIUM. Officii Official Organ of Washington County. FIEST OF AIL THE NEWS. Circulates extensively in the Counties of Martin, Washington, Tyrrell and Beaufsr Job Printing In ItsVarious Branches. l.OO A YEAR IX ADVANCE. " FOB GOD, FOR COUNTKY, AND FOR TRUTH." "SINGLE COPY, 5 tfiXTS. VOL. IX. PLYMOUTH, N. C, 'FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1898. , JVO. 21. I u 4 1 1 A FIELD FLOWER'S COMPLAINT. If I had been a snowdrop,the first one of the Would you have gathered In your hand each . year, fallen rosy leaf, Would you have thought me beautiful,being And said a gentle word for life so beautiful the first, my dear? and brief? If I had been a royal rose, grown higher than your heart, But I that fain would oe a rose and wear her Would you have bent your face to mine and royal red, drawn my leaves apart, A field flower among field flowers, I lift my loveless head : Until they dropped about you feet, and all Among the tall dead nettles, white campion my heart lay bare ? who will heed ? I A broken heart, a golden heart, for you to White campion shrinking faintly mid dock " leave or wear and silverweed ? Nora Hopper, In Black and White. AAXA A AAA AAA AA AAA A AAA A A I The , Busi ness Way. I? V V V V V V V V V V V S V V V V V V V w Jack wanted to, but Lady Mary didn't, and that's the way it all came abiout. Jack swore she was the very daintiest, sweetest, loveliest girl on earth, added a great deal more of love's hyperbole, and entre nous even soared into poetry occasionally, vhen he read to Christopher Colum bus, her pet bull terrier. But as Christopher wrinkled his nose decidedly and his tail did not show the least intimation of a wag, Jack tore it up the poetry, I mean. ' The trouble was Jack wanted to pro pose and couldn't. For never did he bring up the eventful subject but Lady Mary would go off at a tangent, possi bly because Jack was using round about ways. As Jack confided to his chum (who shall be nameless for various reasons) : "Do you know, II., if I speak of sun sets, she will immediately have a wild desire to discuss ethnology or irreg ular Greek verbs, and if I should ever Mention love not that I ever have, y an know but if I ever should, hang ne if I don't believe she'd ask me how my liver was. " By which it can readily be eeen that Lady Mary and Jaok were on the best of terms, and 'the very intimacy seemed to preclude the possibility of anything more. One afternoon I was lying on the river bank industriously rishing, while Jack sprawled upon the grass alter nately reading and scribbling. Then he looked up and observed compla cently: "Now, I flatter myself .that's rather good. Listen, H. : "The weary sun has sunk to rest, And with him fades the dying day. Come night, come hour I love the best, Fit time love's winning words to say. . "Pretty good, eh?" "Good? Qh, Lord! You want to change those last two lines. You should say: "Alas ! still lives a love-struck crank, Who can't say what he wants to say. "Besides, 'best' isn't good gram mar, if you're comparing day with night." - "Hang it all, H., Tennyson himself could not please you." Then a long silence which he at last broke with: "Say, do you think she would have me 9i "Oh, take a run around the block! How do I know? There she comes now, and I give you fair warning if you two my fish poetry." stay here and scare tell about all the away I'll Divinely tall and most divinely fair was Lady Mary. She came trip ping sedately over the tender grass, the mountain winds kissing a delicate peach blossom into her cheeks. Jack, with his customary'facility.rose to his feet and the occasion to play the gal lant. Neither of 'em paid the slight est attention to me. I was supposed to be dead. . J ""Jack," she said, sweetly, "I want vou to row me up to the store. Will you?" Of course Jack acquiesced, and the two of them got into the boat and started." 1 Jack is a finished oarsman, at least he generally finishes it in about ten minutes. I knew it was to be inter esting, so I gave up the fishing and watched them. (Mem. later: They have drifted ' down the river, both behind Lady Mary's parasol.) Now, Jack being one of those fel lows who believe in never losing an opportunity calmly rowed the boat out in the middle of the river and then, as I predicted, shipped the oars and opened the conversation. "How well we get along together in a boat," he remarked, gazing senti mentally at the cliffs. "Yes," abstractedly, "but I wish you'd row up to the store. I don't &waut to waste the whole afternoon Jcclrifting like this." , "No, of course not," waiving up Then, "I euddenly. Two strokes. wish we cc-'d always "Thev-W-;.W new people coin- "in. 'Mr. Eg- I -with a '-'-'jiter- Jack came to me disconsolately. "I wish I was dead," he said. I told him how annoying it would be to me to have him lying around dead. He said I talked like a fool. "Jack.my dear boy," I said, patron izingly (I am two months older than he), "the next time you try to pop the question ba like a bottle of ginger ale. Go off with a bang and let all the fizzle come afterward.'' "I never thought of that," he an swered thoughtfully. "I wonder how it would work? By George, H., you're a trump. I'll try it." That evening they were both down by the spring, and I hid behind a tree. I didn't hear the first part of it, but I got there just in time to hear Jack say: "Lady Mary, I love you.' Will you be my wife?" "With pleasure," she answered, gayly. "You silly boy, why didn't you say so before?" "Just what I told him," said I, com ing from behind the tree. "Did you? You dear boy, you may kiss me for that. Keep still, Jack." And I did. SENATOR MILLS' STORY. Abraham Lincoln's Sweeping Pardon to John L. Helm. Senator Mills has a new story about Lincoln. It was told to him by a son of John L. Helm of Kentucky, who lives in Corsicana: "Old John L. Helm," said the sen ator, "was a famous character in Ken tucky. He was, if I remember right ly, a governor of the state, but at any rate his position was a most prominent one. When the civil war came on Helm wa3 a rabid secessionist. He could not praise the Soutli too highly and could not heap enough' abuse upon the North. He was too old to go into the war with his sons and re mained at home, doing all he could to hehp the confederate cause and harass the Yankees who invaded the state. Finally he became so obstreperous that the federal general who was in com mand near Helm's home put him in prison. The old man's age, the high position which he occupied in the state, his wide connection and espe cially his inability to do any harm, were all pleaded in his extenuation, and he was released. Instead of profit ing by the warning, the old man be came more persistent than ever in his course. Once more he was clapped into jail. This happened two or three times, and finally, while he was still locked up, the matter was brought to the attention of the federal authori ties. Even President Lincoln was ap pealed to and asked to commit the ar dent southerner to an indefinite con finement in order that he might be curbed. x ."Lincoln listened to the statement of the case with more than usual in terest. Then he leaned back and be gan to speak with a smile upon' his face. 'You are talking about old man John Helm? Well, did you know that I used to live when I was a boy in Helm's town. He was kind to me. He seemed to like me as a boy, and he never lost an opportunity to help me. He seemed to think,' said Lin coln, with another of his almost pa thetic smiles, 'that I would probably make something of a man. Why, when I went out to Illinois, poor and un known, that man gave me the money to pay my way and keep me until I got a start. John Helm? O, yes, I know him, and I know what I owe to him. I think I can fix his case.' "And then," said Senator Mills, "Lincoln went to his desk and wrote a few words. The bit of writing ,is treasured in the Helm household to this day. Tfiis is what the president wrote: , " 'I hereby pardon John L. Helm of Kentucky for all that he has ever done against the United States and all that he ever will do. 'Abraham Lincoln.'" Washington Post. Dangerous to Wear. Men exposed to the rigors of the Alaska winter never wear mustaches. They wear full beards to protect the throat and face, but keep the upper lin clean shaven. The moisture from ?'the breath congeals so quickly that a JVoustache becomes imbedded in a Mid cake of ice and the face is frozen ,'Vore a man knows it. ''IV, Kiclily Deserved. y(r wife got even with that bur V,1 set the burglar alarm going . v? baby." V-Vdo?" v : vt;nm in by the collar v "U Vck the baby to sleep v u ) Free Press. OLDEST AMERICAN CITY. REMARKABLE DISCOVERIES RECENT LY MADE AT COPAN. The Mysterious City of Honduras, the Cradle of Maya Civilization Remains of Great Temples and Palaces -A Huge Structure 800 Feet High. The Central American explorer, George Byron Gordon, contributes an article entitled "The Mysterious City of Honduras," to the Century. This gives au account of the recent remark able discoveries made at Copan. Mr. Gordon says : . Hidden away among the mountains of Honduras, in a beautiful valley which, even in that little-traveled country, where remoteness is a char acteristic attribute of places, is unusu ally secluded, Cojmn is one of the greatest mysteries of the ages. After the publication, in 1840, of Stephens' account of his visit to the ruins, which made them kuown for the first time to the world, the interest awakened by his graphic description, and the draw ings that accompanied it from the skillful pencil of Catherwood, re lapsed, and until within the last de cade writers on the subject of Ameri can archaeology were dependent en tirely for information . concerning Copan upon the writings of Stephens, which were regarded by many with skepticism and mistrust. Not only do the recent explorations confirm the ac count given by Stephens as regards the magnitude and irujjortance of the ruins, but the collection of relics now in the Peabody museum is sufficient to convince the most skeptical that here are the remains of a city, un known to history, as remarkable and as worthy of our careful consideration as any of the ancient centres of civili zation in the Old World. Whatever the origin of its people, this old city is distinctly American the growth of American soil and environment. The gloomy forest, the abode of monkeys and jaguars, which clothed the valley at the time of Stephens' visit, was in great part destroyed about thirty years ago by a colony from Guatemala, who came to plant in the fertile soil of the valley the tobacco for which, much more than for the ruins, that valley is famous throughout Central America today. They left the trees that grew upon the higher structures, forming a picturesque grove, a rem nant of which still remains a few cedars and ceibas of gigantic propor tions, clustered about the ruins of the temples shrouding them in a sombre shade, and sending their huge roots into the crevices and, unexplored chambers and vaults and galleries of the vast edifices. The area comprised within the limits of the old city consists of a level plain seven or eight miles long and two miles wide at the greatest. This plain is covered with the remains of stone houses, doubtless the habitations of the wealthy. The streets, squares and courtyards were paved with stone or with white cement made from lime and powdered rock, and the drainage was accomplished by means of covered canals and underground sewers built of stone and cement. On the slopes of the mountains, too, are found nu merous ruin, and even on the high est peaks fallen columns and ruined structures may be seen. On the right bank of the Copan river, in the midst of the city, stands the principal group of structures the temples, palaces and buildings of a public character. These form part of what has been called, for want of a better name, the Main Structure a vast, irregular pile, rising from the plain in steps and terraces of masoury and terminating in several great pyra midal elevations, each topped by the remains of a temple which, before our excavations begun, looked like a huge pile of fragments bound together by the roots of trees, while the slopes of the iyramids and the ten aces and pavements below are strewn with the ruins of these superb edifices. This huge structure, unlike the great pyra mids of Egypt and other works of a similar character, is not the embodi ment of a definite idea, built in accor dance with a preconceived plan and for a specific purpose, but is rather the complex result of a long process of de velopment, corresponding to the growth of culture and keeping pace with the expanding tastes of the peo ple or the demands of their national life. Its sides face the four cardinal points; its greatest length from north to g'outh is about eight hundred feet, and from east to west it measured originally nearly as much, but a part of the eastern side has been carried away by the swift current of the river which flows directly against it. The interior of the structure is thus ex posed in the form of a cliff one hun dred and twenty feet high, presenting 8, complicated system of buried walls and floors down to the water's edge doubtless the remains of older build ings, occupied for a time, and aban doned to serve as foundations for more elaborate structures, but sculptured monuments as well. The theory of development, though at cannot be set aside, seems inadequate to explain this curious circumstauce; and yet there is just enough difference between these art relics and( those of later date to indicate a chaiige in style and treatment.' Whether on not this change continues ia regular j seauence lower down has not yet been determined. If, as I am inclined to believe, we shall find, ; away down in the lower levels, the rude beginnings from which the culture of the later period devel oped, we shall have pretty conclusive evidence not only that Copan is the oldest of the Maya cities, but that the Copan valley itself, with the immedi ate vicinity, was the cradle of the Maya civilization. Art of Climbing Stairs. One of America's leading physicians is quoted as saying that few people understand the art of climbing stair ways without making themselves tired before reaching the top. Says our in formant on this subject: "Usually a person will tread on the ball of his foot in taking each step. This is very tiresome and wearing on the muscles," as it throws the entire weight of the body on the muscles of the legs and feet. You should, in walking or climbing stairs, seek for the most equal distribution of the body's weight possible. In walking upstairs your feet should be placed squarely down on the step, heel and all, and then the work should be per formed slowly and deliberately. In this way there is no strain upon any particular muscle, but each one is do ing its duty in a natural manner. The man who goes upstairs with a spring you may be sure i3 no philosopher, or, at least, his reasoning has not been directed to that subject. The doctor might have gone a little further in the same line, and protested against the habit which many persons have of bending over half double whenever they ascend a flight of stairs. In ex ertion of this kind, when the heart is naturally excited to more rapid action, it is desirable that the lungs should have full play. But the crouching po sition interferes with their action, the blood is imperfectly aerated, and there is trouble right away. Give the lungs a chance to do their work everywhere and at all times." American Colleges. The number, large and small, of educational institutions in the United States aspiring to the name of college is far greater than any one would imagine who has not specially inves tigated the subject, and it is fair to say that some of the smaller and newer ones are doing equally good work with their elders. According to last year's statistics (1896) there were 478 "universities and colleges of liberal arts" in the United States. Of, these, Ohio has the largest number of any one state, 40; Illinois, 31; Mis souri, 30; Pennsylvania, 30; New, York, Iowa aud Tennessee, 23 each; Kansas, 18; Indiana and Kentucky, 15 each; California, 16; North Caro lina and Texas, 13 each; Michigan and Minnesota, 11 each; Nebraska, Mary land, Wisconsin and Georgia, 10 each; Massachusetts, Virginia, Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana and. South Carolina, 9 each. In the total num ber of students, Illinois leads with 13,252; Ohio comes next with 12,806, and New York third with 11,615. Mas sachusetts has a total of 6244, and Pennsylvania 9048. The older and best known institutions are: Harvard,' Cambridge, Mass. ; Yale, New Haven, Conn.; Princeton, Princeton, N. J.; Dartmouth, Hanover, N. H. ; Brown, Providence, R. I.; Cornell, Ithaca, N. -Y. ; Columbia, New York city; Amherst, Amherst, Mass. ; William aud Mary college, Williamsburg, Va. ; University of Virginia, CharlottsvilleJ Va. ; Johns Hopkins, Baltimore, Md. : and others. Boston Transcript. The Sword of the Shah. A Sheffield firm has been by special firman appointed goldsmiths and sil versmiths to his imperial majesty and to the court of Persia. They are exe cuting for the shah an imperial sword, designs of which have been approved. The blade is double-eged, of the finest steel, inlaid with gold. The weapon has a broad flute down the centre and is of scimiter shape, terminating in a fine point or clif. The scabbard is of royal scarlet Persian leather, with mountings in gold filigree, while the hilt is of ivory, inlaid with gold ara besques and inscriptions in Persian text. Thj cross-bar and head of the hilt is studded with diamonds, rubies aud other precious stones. Paris Mes senger. Animals That Never Drink. There are many kinds of animals in the world that never in all their lives sip so much as a drop of water. A parrot lived for 52 years in the Zoo at London without drinking a drop of water, and many naturalists believe the only moisture imbibed by wild rabbits is derived from green herbage laden with dew. Many reptiles serpents, lizards and certain kinds of frogs and toads live and thrive in places entirely devoid of w ater, and sloths are also said never to drink. CJueer System of enumeration. The Indians of Guiana have a queer system of numeration. They count by the hand and its four fingers. Thus, when they reach five, instead of saying so, they call it a "hand." Six is, therefore.a "hand and first finger." Ten is "two hands," but twenty, in stead of being "four hands" is "a man." . Forty is "twomen," and thus they go on by twenties. Forty-six is express , "two men, baud and first finssr. . ' - KENTUCKY GOOSE FAEM. RAISING CEESE ON A LARGE SCALE FOR THE NEW YORK MARKET. How the Long-Necked Fowl Are Collect ed and Made IJeady for the Slaughter Flock of 5200 Birds Habits of the Noisy Creatures Clean Birds. "Where do the thousands of He brews in New York city get their fat geeseJ They got 18,000 of them in 1897 from Kentucky. They are being shipped by eel Benaker of Cynthiana, Ky., writes a Chicago Record correspond ent. Renaker has the most unique establishment of the kind in the West. On the Licking river, just above the town of Cynthiana, he has erected a large wooden building, 80 by 150 feet, aud two stories high. The floors slant gradually to a common centre, so that they can be flooded, and thus kept clean. There, are troughs placed at convenient points to hold food for the geese. At present there are 5200 geese in this building in different stages of the fattening process. They are gathered from all parts of the state, and when they arrive they average in weight from four to eight pounds. They are first placed in the large yard in which the building is situated, where they are furnished an abundance of water,; that they can clean themselves. With in a few days they are placed in the house in the fattening pens. It re quires four or five weeks careful feed ing to fatten the geese. The estab lishment is provided with a steam corn mill and corn sheller. The corn is purchased from the farmers in the neighborhood and is shelled and ground into meal. The cobs run down a chute to the furnace and make enough fuel to run the machinery. The meal is mixed into a dough and in that form is fed to the geese. In an interview Mr. Benaker gave the following interesting facts regard ing geese, their habits and the man ner in which they are marketed: "A goose is the cleanest fowl alive. I have been in the poultry business since 1871, have handled all kinds of domestic fowl, and have studied their habits closely. They are constantly at work keeping their feathers clean, and if furnished with plenty of water they are never seen except when fit for dress parade. They are equally as careful regarding their food. On one occasion we bought a lot of corn which had grown musty and the geese would not eat the dough made from it. Nor will they eat dough after it has soured. On this account we have to be very careful to mix up no more dough than the geese will eat in a day. "Another thing peculiar about geese is that they eat a great deal more on some days than they do on others. For instance, it frequently requires 30 or 40 buckets of dough a day to a given pen of geese. Then for a few days they will probably not eat more than a dozen buckets. When fur uished plenty of water and wholesome food geese fatten rapidly and have no disease, but unless they are afforded an opportunity to keep themselves clean and furnished with pure food they die rapidly. They are sold by the pair and they average when fat from 14 to 38 pounds. "We sell our geese in -only one market New York city. They are shipped in poultry cars and are fur nished with au abundance of water and cornmeal dough while they are on the way. The reason they are shipped alive is that ' Jews cannot purchase them after they are killed. In 1896 we shipped about 12,000 geese to New York city, and in 1897 we handled 18,000 of them. The capacity of our house is about 5500. It requires three men to attend the corn sheller and the mill and to feed the geese. We have waterworks connections and keep the house clean by flooding the floors. "No, I don't think there is another establishment of the kind in Ken tucky. There may be a few in the West. I think that more geese are raised in Kentucky than in any two of the Western states. You know our farmers are mostly descendants of, Virginians and Marylanders, who settled here 100 years ago, and who raised their own geese to provide feather beds for their families. This habit ha3 been continued to the pres ent generation and there are fewfarms especially in the older-settled sec tions of the state on which there are no geese. Although the cotton mat tress largely ha3 taken the place of the feather bed, the wives of Kentucky farmers continue to raise geese as their mothers and grandmothers did before them. Thus it is that we are enabled to gather so many geese at this point. "Yes, the business is peculiar, but it has its fascinations. Geese have a great deal more sense than they are given credit for, and they learn to know their attendants and seem to ap preciate the care and attention they receive. We have several different breeds in Kentucky, of which the Hong Kong is the most popular. The old-fashior ed blue goose is quite nu merous, and many of these have been crossed with wild geese, the wildbirda straying away from their flocks during periods of migration from the south tetha north ia the early'spring.'V . SCIENTIFIC SCRAPS. A Brazilian doctor says that coffeo ia a certain cure for anaemia. Trolley car ambulances are to be in troduced in the city of Pittsburg, run ning independently over all the street m v fi'n ill- u no t rt Miss Eleanor Ormerod declares that the English cockroach is in danger of extermination before the hordes of imported German black beetles. What is probably the largest loco- . motive in the world has just been com pleted and weighs, . with the tender, over 285,000 pounds. It is for use in Mexico. Munich used to be notorious for its excessive tvnhoidJ' leath-rate. it being twenty-nine per lorOOO in 185&T With the introduction of a pure 3V.aier supply and improved sewer systeni.it him fnlleii t.rt loan tlinn hvn nor 1H OOO . ,. The Semaine Medical publishes de tails of the successful experiments made in Naples by Cantaui in making guinea pigs immune against the influ enza poison by vaccinating them with sterilized cultures of the influenza bacillus. Professor George Lincoln Goodale of Harvard university says that there are now about 200,000 species of plants, divided into flowering and flowerless plants, and although nearlv all of the flowering varieties might be used for food, only about 1000 are so used and only 300 are frequently. In a paper read before the Paris Academy of Sciences, M. Jacquemin communicated the results of experi ments showing that leaves of fruit trees, vines, etc., develop a strong bouquet of the fruit when soaked in alcohol. He thinks the quality of a poor vintage might be improved by the addition of some leaves during 'ermentation. Systematic Farming. George G. and J. Carroll Hamilton of Flat Creek, Bath county, are among the most extensive farmers in this section of the country, and they are also very successful. And why? Be cause they go at it in a business-like manner. These gentlemen own and manage four large farms, one in this county, one in Bath, one in Ohio and one in MissourL They employ Colonel Gumf, an expert bookkeeper, whose duty it is to keep an open ac count with every field on each of these farms. Reports are made to the colonel every day of the amount of work done in each field and every thing in the M ay of cost to produce any article in these fields is charged up to it, just the same as a mer chant would charge you with any article you might purchase from his store. So when the crop is sold they always know whether they have made or lost money. This is a system, we venture to say, very few farmers in Kentucky practice, and while most every farmer will admit that it is a good one, still very few of them will follow the example of these gentle men. The trouble with a great many of our farmers these days is that they like to be in town too much. If they would stay at home except when they have business in town they would be better off. Now, we don't want our friends who are landowners to take offense at this, for we are interested in their success. When the farmers are successful everybody will prosper, and that is why we make the sugges tion that they give their land more attention instead of sitting around on drygoods boxes in town whittl ing sticks. Mt. Sterling (Ky.) Sen tinel Democrat. Bnt the Dog Would Not Keep Still. A dog caused some commotion at a prominent East Side church Sunday evening. He sneaked into the church and kept fairly quiet until the bass so loist was singiug a beautiful selection, "Wait Thou Still." But the dog did not heed the injunction of the singer. He barked right out in meeting, and some of the audience smiled. Just as the singer concluded his song the dog gave forth one sharp vigorous bark, as if of approval. The singer did not show any sigus of interruption, bnt it certainly was somewhat trying on his nerves to sing while this dog was walking up and down the aisle. The nrpftfl)fv Raw the. dno" lipfnrft liabarkpd. and so ludicrous was the situation that the preacher could not refrain from laughing. The dog was hustled out of church, but not until he had entered a protest in the shape of barks and growls. Columbus Dispatch. An Ancient Deed. A New Haven man ia the owner of a valuable historical document, the deed of forty acres of land in Portland, which was conveyed in 1733 to the Bev. Moses Bartlett, for a considera tion of $500. The paper is intact, save where it has been folded. At the conclusion are affixed twenty seals of twenty Indians. The seals are of red wax, aud a coin was evidently used in stamping the seals, as slight traces of a crown can be found in sev eral of them. An Karneit Bidder. "Daughter, do you think young Tompkins means business?" "Of course, papa; I have just .re ceived his sealed proposal." Chicago Record.