ft fft Iff 111 x 0
' ' I II I ... I I . I M . M I I ' I Mill-- ' ' I I II 111 ' T 1 ' H . ! fc,
$i.oo a Year, In Advance. "FOR GOP, FOR COUNTRY, AND FOR TRUTH." Single Copy, 5 Cent.
VOL. XIV. PLYMOUTH, N. C. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1903. NO. 25
THE
Thrioe blessed is the eeotist
W ho fancies him creation's lord.
lAnd ioMs that in the scheme of things
He. only ho, is heaven's ward.
"Sweet consolation' in the thought
For all tke ills that him pursue; '
llis egotism, in effect,
, Makes all his fond delusions true.
For him the skies are blue above,
For him the scented zephyrs blow,
For him the minstrel birds do sing,
And mighty rivers rise and flow.
COMMITTED
BS3
If
V 1
BY A. ST. JOHN ADCOCK.
'"mas'
r tOi HE steward knocked and
'V o door.
J "Cabin passengei. sir,
Cr No. 1G," he reported, with
a businesslike brevity. "Very bad."
"What's the matter with him?"
: "Dun'no, sir. Uncommon bad."
'. "Usual thing, I suppose?"
' "No, sir. Not seasick. Queer when
he came aboard yesterday, I thought.
Been in bed all daj'. Wouldn't let me
get him anything till just now ho
asked me to fetch you."
"No. 1G, you say? All right."
' The steward withdrew, and the doc
. lor only delayed to finish the first para
graph of a letter he had been writing
when he was interrupted.
' it was not precisely an urgent letter,
for lie had no intention of doing any
thing with it until the shlp arrived at
Liverpool; but it was a letter that re
quired a deal of consideration, and,
though he was in most things phleg
matic, he was impatient to have it all
ready to post immediately he landed,
for it was to contain much that he
knew he could not possibly put into
speech, and it was to tell the recipient
that he would arrive less than half a
3ay behind it.
Few of the passengers were In bed
yet, for the night was young; the sea
was quiet and the outer air pleasantly
warm, and through the rhythmic throb
bing of the engine he could hear chat
tering and laughter and footsteps pac
ing overhead as he made his way be
tween decks to his patient.
The lamp that shone from the wall of
'So. 1(5 showed him a haggard man
strctfhed on the bunk apparently
asleep.
He was a youngish man not much
over thirty, anyway. His features
were gaunt and tanned with hard liv
ing and rough weather, and his hands
were coarsened as with manual em
ployments. He slept uneasily and his
breathing was stertorious and diffi
cult. While the doctor was taking this pre
liminary survey of him he coughed
and awoke.
"Steward!"
"I'm the doctor. You sent for me.
What's wrong?"
"Oh, thanks. ... I didn't know,
doctor. I've felt awfully knocked up
for days past, and thought I could
throw it off but I can't. My head's
all niire, and my hands, too. Feel
that."
The doctor took his hand and laid a
finger ou his pulse. The hand was
hot and dry, the pulse was galloping
furiously, and a brief examination was
sufficient to diagnose his ailment.
"A touch of pneumonia," said Yalden.
"You must take more care of your
self than you've been doing lately. You
were not fit to travel; 3-ou must have
felt ill before your started."
"I wanted to get home," the other
answered, wearily. "I've been away
a long time."
"We must see what we can arrange
about nursing," the doctor concluded.
"I'll give you some medicine; you've
got a good constitution, and. with care,
you'll pull round all right."
r "Think so?" " "'
"Oh. yes. ... He mustn't be left,
Harrow." The doctor turned to the
steward. "Somebody will have to sit
up writh him to-night. I'll see him
again before I turn in, and I'll get the
captain to let you have some assist
ance." After fnlfilling which latter duty he
retired to his cabin and resumed the
laborious composition of his letter.
i A glimpse of what he was writing
would have amazed any man who
knew him. For to everybody who
knew him, with one possible exception,
Dr. Yalden was a matter-of-fact, rather
unsympathetic, wholly unroniantlc
man. of nearer fifty than forty; where
as the letter that was slowly develop
ing under his pen might almost have
EGOTIST.
The splendid heavens oft unroll
Their starry scroll for his delight,
j And nature whispers to his soul
' , In all the voices of the night.
Though pains tnay rack his mortal frame,
Though under foot his hopes are trod,
He welcomes all, as kindly tests,
To prove him worthy of his God.
Oh, splendid and sublime self-love! ,
Ambition, hope and friendship fan,
But thy fair light still leads the soul.
Serene, unconquered, through the vale!
St. Louis Globe-Democrat.
TO THE DEEP.
been written by a sentimental young
ster in the rapturous agonies of first
love. Nobody would have credited the
doctor with possessing the smallest
streak of sentiment anywhere in his
robust, substantial person. He never
suspected it himself even until three
years ago.
Three years ago he met in London
the girl he told himself he had been
looking for all his life. She was nearly
twenty years his junior, but what did
that matter? Her people had been
rich and proud, and now, through re
cent financial disasters, they were poor
and prouder, but what did all that mat
ter, either? He loved her, and cared
for nothing else if she could only love
him.
He had been impelled to tell her so;
for his ingrained hardness and self-re
strain had failed him at the first touch
of this bewildering passion that, so
long a-coming, subdued him utterly at
last. She heard him with pity in her
eyes, but not love; and she told him,
with only pity in her tones, that the
man she loved was dead and her heart
was buried with him.
Later, he learned the story tfiat lay
behind her words, and saw more hope
in it for himself than she had given
him, for surely his living love of her
could, in due time, win her away from
the memory of a dead rival. Beginning
to flatter himself that she was already
relenting toward him, he had appealed
to her again before he last left home,
and she had seemed to waver she
silenced him tremulously, and had
seemed to hesitate; and feeling that?
each new day put a barrier between
her and her past and removed one from
betwixt himself and her,- he would not
take her answer then, but begged her
to think of all it must mean to him and
let him ask her for it, once for all,
when he came home from his next voy
age. He was speeding homeward now, and
the letter was to prepare her for his
coming.
He wrote it with so many pauses for
reflection that by 10 o'clock it was still
intinished when, mindful of his pa
tient, he relocked it in his desk.
No. 1G was awake, but drowsy with
sheer weakness.
"The chest's still troublesome," he
answered, with a feeble cheerfulness,
but I'm a trifle better, thanks."
The doctor was not so sure of that.
"We've got to keep your sirength up,
somehow," he said; adding to the stew
ard, "Get some beef tea for him,. Bar
row. I'll stay here while you re gone."
The dim, stuffy little cabin was silent
for awhile, except for the labored res
piration of the sick man, who present
1 J
ly, becoming aware of the doctor's
ruminant scrutiny, roused himself to
speak.
"If I don't pull through this, doc
tor "
"Don't worry about that; you will."
"But if I don't I'm not afraid of
dying. I've been near it too often for
that; and yet, now, it seems harder
than it ever did before."
"You'd better not talk. I don't want
you to exeit? 3'ourself."
"Not me! What I mean is, it would
be hard luck to die on the way home.
I've been away nearly nine years. I
went away rs poor as a rat, and I'ra
coming back rich. That'3 something,
isn't it?"
"It's a great deal."
"To me it is. I didn't go out because
I'd got the gold fever It's
out to the Klondyke I've been, doctor;
away beyond Dawson City, up the
Yukon Lord! it's the kind of country
you see in nightmares. I've been see
ing it over antl over in nightmares ever
since I've been ill." , 4
"Don't think of it "
"I wish I couldn't!" He laughed, but
there was a feverish brightness in his
eye, and his voice quavered with sup
pressed excitement. "I haven't had
time to think of it till now." .,.
t
Tic went on talking, and Yalden lis
tened absently, with strange doubts
troubling his mind; and, so listening,
he half-unconsclously fashioned from
the other's words visions of vast snow
wastes stretching into the night or the
day, now silent and lonely as death,
now blurred, and whirling, and howl
ing with the fury of a storm, and al
ways deep In the desolation of it, a des.
perate little band of adventurers strug
gled forlornly, chasing a dream, starv
ing and falling, and dying, some of
them, In the track of it; and here, at
last, with the unimaginable terrors of
that bleak wilderness left behind him.
one of the few survivors had emerged
triumphant, with his dream realized.
Triumphant, so far.
The doctor eyed him gloomily from
under a frown.
"And I'm not dead, though I'm sup
posed to be!" the other chuckled grim
ly. "One everlasting, terrible winter
we were snowed up miles away from
anywhere, and we were put down as
done for. The wonder is that we were
not. Only two of us managed to
worry through, and we wandered
heaven only knows where, and we
lived well, we didn't live. But we
worried through and I'm going home."
His eyes closed, and fie rambled on
dreamily: "Nine years! but she'll be
waiting. I told her that it wouldn't
be more than two and she said, 'It's
till you come, Ned; and if you never
come I shall wait, till I meet you, at
the end.' "
He lay quiet a moment, and then
opening his eyes and finding the doc
tor regarding him intently, he con
tinued:
"We've never written to each other.
We promised her people we wouldn't.
She was to be free to change, If she
would; they said it was best. I had no
money and no prospects, but if I went
back a rich man and she had not
changed I knew she never
would. Whether I lived or died, she
said she would never change and she
won't."
"Did you say your name was Edwin
Ashton?"
The doctor was startled by the alien
sound of his own voice.
The sick man nodded, and, poiutlng
across the cabin:
"Her portrait's in my bag. doctor,"
he said. "Do you mind getting it for
me? My will's In there, too. I made it
as soon as I struck my first luck, in
case Oh, what I wanted to
ask you, doctor, was if I don't pull
round, will you have my bag and ev
erything sent to her? You'll find her
address "
"Yes, yes. But not now," Yalden in
terrupted harshly. "You've talked too
much already. ..... Come along.
Barrow," he hailed the advent of the
steward with ineffable relief. "Call
me if he is worse in the night."
He was dazed and stupefied by the
knowledge that had come upon him so
unexpectedly, and yearned to get away
and be alone where ho might think
of it.
Yet he could not think of it even
when he was alone, for every thought
as it touched his brain flamed into
madness and became an incoherent
flicker that dazzled and baffled him.
One thought only burned to a clear
and fiercely steady blaze a sinister,
diabolical thought that he dared not
face, and could not extinguish.
"My God!" he muttered, pacing his
cramped room like a caged animal.
"It's more than I can bear!"
He lost all count cf time, as a man
does when h? sleeps, but when the
steward summoned him hurriedly an
hour after midnight he had evidently
not been in bed; a light was burning
in his cabin, he was still dressed, and
his face was wan and his eyes heavy
as if in pain.
"Mr. Ashton's worse, sir. Edwards
is with him, and he called me to fetch
you. He can't sleep. Keeps sitting up.
Edwards says, star'ng as if he could
see people, an talking very siag'lar.
Delirious, I expect, sir."
"We must try a sleeping draught."
said Yalden dully. "I'll be there di
rectly."
Bai-row being gone, he busied Llrn-
self in the medicine cupbeard, and
hastened after hiu, carrying something
in a glass.
Drawing near to No. 13 h could hear
the sick man babbling monotonously,
and the very sound of his voice stung
him and quickened that fire to a
fiercer flame within bio:; till suddenly
he caught a word of what the man was
saying merely a name, br.t the utter
ance of it checked him instantly, as If a
hand had plucked at his sleeve.
He stood trembling, and in that same
instant saw, shaping while ia the
darkness before him, a sweet, sad face,
grown pale with weary years of long
ingthe pure, wistful eyes looked into
his, and their calmness calmed him,
and their sadness made him ashamed.
He was sane again; he could not go
on, but yielded to gentler impulses as
readily as if the utterance of her name
had conjured her there in very reality
to turn back, and he regained his bet
ter self in her presence.
With a something breaking like a
sob in his throat, he swiftly retraced
his steps, pausing in the unlighted
saloon to open one of the portholes and
fling the glass he carried far out Into
the dark.
Thereafter, he sat till well into the
day watching and tending the man she
loved and had loved so long. He
shrank from trusting himself alone
with his own thoughts again yet; and,
because she loved him and her happi
ness was bound up in his life, all that
unhappy night he fought with death
for the man he hated.
Going on deck in the morning he
leaned over the side to tear up the
letter he had written and scatter lis
fragments into the sea.
It was the burial of a great hope
that had died in the night.
As he walked away, the captain, com
ing from breakfast, met him and lin
gered to make inquiries.
" 'Morning, doctor; how's the patient?
You're not going to make a funeral of
it, I hope?"
"Not quite," Y'alden laughed careless
ly. "He has taken a turn for the
better"-Black and White.
Forests Destroyed by Goats.
Sheep and goats when numerous are
liable to cause widespread injury, par
ticularly in forested regions. An in
structive example of the damage done
by goats is afforded by St. Helena,
which is a mountainous island scarcely
fifty square miles in extent, its highest
summits reaching an elevation of 2700
feet. At the time of Its discovery,
about the beginning of the sixteenth
century, it is said to have been covered
by dense forest; to-day it is described
as a rocky desert. This change has
been largely brought about by goats,
first introduced by the Portuguese in
1513, and which multiplied so fast that
in seventy-five years they existed by
thousands. Browsing on the young
trees and shrubs they rapidly brought
about the destruction of the vegetation
which protected the steep slopes. With
the disappearance of t'.e undergrowth
began the washing of the soil by trop
ical rains and the destruction of the
forest!
Which Got Her?
What appears to be a triangular
elopement in Indiana is disclosed in the
disappearance of a father, son and a
pretty girl to whom both had been
paying attention. For some months
Furdum Lucas, aged sixty, has been
paying court to Miss Nettie Ilivers, a
domestic. His suit won favor, until a
week ago, when Lucas' sou, Henry Lu
cas, appeared, and he, too, paid court
to the young woman. It developed the
trio disappeared during the night. The
puzzling question now is did the girl
marry the father or the son, or either?
All three boarded the same train and
have not been heard from since. Chi
cago Inter-Ocean.
! Bee Plants.
There have been some attempts at
the cultivation of plants especially
adapted to honey productions, but they
have been abandoned as unprofitable.
A small patch of bloom does, not
amount to a great deal in the way of
honey production there must be acres
and acres of bloom. The raising of
crops that produce honey in addition
to something else (buckwheat and al
sike clover, for Instance), and the scat
tering of sweet clover or catnip seed,
and the like, in waste places, seems
to be the most that can be done profita
bly in this direction. Country Life in
America.
Instinct of Wiltl Animals.
It has been stated that animals in
stinctively avoid any vegetation that
might be harmful to them. This may
be true to a certain extent of animals
in a wild state, but even they In times
of dearth will devour anything that
comes within their reach, while domes
tie animals show very little discretion
at any time. In some parts of this
country thousands of cattle and poul
try perish yearly from eating poisonous
plants.
The Largest trl!amet.
The Hungarian House of Represen
tatives is the largest in the world. It
has 751 members
FACTS ABOUT FLOODS.
Influence of Vegetation and Forests
Upon Rainfall.
As a sponge will absorb and hold a
certain quantity of water and no more,
so the air will hold a certain quanti
ty of vapor and no more.
But the sponge can be relied on to
hold the same amount of water at all
time, while the air cannot. Whatever
amount may be stored in the air at
any particular moment, it is impossi
ble to say with certainty how long
that supply will stay there.
All over the whole earth water is
vanishing and reappearing, and com
ing into sight out of the air; being
evaporated and being condensed;
passing from the liquid to the gase
ous form, and from the gaseous to the
liquid form.
So the air is always at work, taking
in moisture from every possible quar
ter until full. As soon as the atmos
phere is thoroughly saturated it re
turns to take in another drop.
The annual average rainfall, includ
ing melted snow, over the United
States, varies in different sections of
the country from less than four inches
to more than one hundred inches, the
quantity depending largely on the ele
vation, distance from the ocean, and
the direction either of the prevailing
wind, or on accidental winds caused
by the passage of storm centre3 across
the country.
There is a well-marked tendency in
Illinois, Iowa, the entire Missouri val
ley, Nebraska and Kansas to a very
wet May and June, or June and July.
As there are three cf the four months
in which cyclonic conditions of the at
mosphere prevail, the resultant heavy
rains and cloud-burst are easily ac
counted for. As the country named is
almost as flat as Holland, and filled
with broad, sluggish, shallow rivers,
floods follow as a matter of course.
Apart from even exceedingly heavy
rains or downpours may be classed the
enormous masses of water which now
and then fall, .and which are .popularly
known In America as cloud-bursts or
water spouts. In such . cases the
ancient of water that fallsJn- an hour
or two must equal rainfalls-which are
otherwise deemed excessive for a day
or even for a month in that region.
These, as the reports of the United
States signal service show, hare
aused many of the most destructive
floods.
The question of the Influence of veg
etation and forests upon rainfall is a
perplexing one, and from its charac
ter is not susceptible of positive proof
or disproof. The influence of forests
on rainfall or temperature must de
pend on the extent, density and char
acter of the woodland growth. The
evaporating and absorptive powers of
foliage necessarily vary with the spe
cies, and are also dependent for nearly
half the year on the amount of leaves.
There is no question, however, but
that the presence of vegetation sub
serves the conservation of rainfall and
aids in its regular and systematic dis
tribution. The cloud-bursts and disas
trous floods described in the reports of
the signal corps, as already pointed
out, have almost all occurred in those
states where rainfalls are infrequent
and there are no forest growths.
Automatic Swiss Restaurants.
Automatic bars have become so suc
cessful in Switzerland that a Company
has been formed to supply the Swiss
and their visitors with electric auto
matic restaurants, where, as if by ma
gic, meals ranging from the modest
chop and chips to the elaborate six
course table d'hote, will be served by
electricity to all comers. The only
thing necessary is to take your seat,
glance over the bill of fare, place
your money in the right slot, and the
machinery does the rest. Prices will
be strictly moderate, and a dainty
dinner, with wine included, will only
cost about two shillings. London Ex
press. A quart of oysters contains about
the same amount of nutrition as a
quart of milk, three-quarters of a
pound of lean beef, two pounds of
fresh cod or a pound of bread.
Canine Intelligence.
Pete "De lumberyard gang had dat
yellow pup well trained."
Jimmy "Dat bo?"
Pete "Ycu bet. Why, every time
dey'd tie a can to his tail he'd go down
to Kelly's an' being it bak full oC
beer."
The most progressive paper-hanger
ire always pressed to the wall.