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About Plattsmouth weekly journal. (Plattsmouth, Neb.) 1881-1901 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 29, 1894)
COWBOY AND CORSET. BY CAPTAIN JACK CRAWFORD. "I jest wish you had never went to Dallas. I wish you'd stayed here on the ranch en kep' on a bein yer own self, Etead o driftin off the rang-e to the city an' a malt in' a play to be a high-tone leddy. Y' ain't like yo' used to be, Cassie." There was a scowl on the cowboy' face as he stood before Cassie Denton, the daughter of the owner of the Texas ranch at which he was employed. The face of the bright-eyed little maiden wore a pained look as she toyed with the buckskin wrist loop which depended from the handle of the ix-shooter in his belt. "I knowfcd just how it would be," he continued, -'When yer pop pot the notion into his head that yo must be ed Seated an be a leddy, I tol' him it's Fpile yo. I tol' him yo' never would be the same gal no mo', that yer little head d git turned there among the fine t:tock, au yo wouldn't have no mo' use fur graded critters sich as the ridera o' the ranges." - 'But Bob," the girl interrupted, "I m not changed in mv feelings toward jtdu. I love you just as well as I did the day pop said I could marry you, and he sent me to school for two years jast to make me fit to be your wife. It was all for your sake. Bob, and it's real bad of you to act so after I had studied ao hard to make of myself a lady woilhy of such a man as j-ou. I know I'm not like I used to be. I am not rough and wild like I was once, I dress better and 1 talk better. It's refine ment. Bob that what Miss Bentley, the teacher, said, and she said that a girl without refinement was just a wart on the face of society. That's just what she said. Bob, in her own words, and I feel like crying at the way you act." T'd a whole lot rather see you a good, healthy wart on the face o' so ciety, than to see yo a dab o' bright paint on one o its cheeks, or a string o no 'count beads a hangin .bout its neck. Style is fur them that lives in cities. Cassie. an' is jest as much out o place in here on the ranch as a cheap herdin greaser 'd be out o place in glory. I'd never belicvod it of yo. Cassie, that yo'd come back here with your f oretop curled up in a bunch, an' a corset cinched 'round yo. I wouldn't. I swear I wouldn't. No wom an kin make a rancher a good wife that wears a fashion pack-saddle, an bunches up her mane like yours is bunched- I mout git over the curl business in time, but I ain't never goin' to have no wife that'll cinch herself up o's 6he can't breathe below " With a scream of laughter the girl placed her hand over bis mouth and checked his further speech. "Oh! Bob, Bob. you naughty boy! Is it my poor little corset that has come be tween us to ward off your love? Oh! I must laugh, for it's really the funniest thing I ever heard of. Why, Bob, I could never live without a corset. It is 6uch a support and comfort, and you know, you wicked boy, that my figure is much prettier than it was before I went to Dallas. Isn't it, now?" She placed tier hands against her waist and waltzed saucily around so that he could inspect her neat form. "No, tain't. 'Tain't free an' easy like Ood intended it should be. If He'd a wanted yo pinched up like y' are now, lie d 'a built yo' that way. 'There'd be jest as much sense in cinch in' up cows to make 'em look purty. Yo'd laugh yer eyes out to see a cow a goin' 'round here with corsets on an', yo" hear me, it's jest as ridiculous fur & gal to do it. I'm a goin' to round up the ranges fur a gal 'at's got more savey than to wear sich monstrousi ties, 'relse I never will double up in matermony long as I liTe. Throw em away, Cassie, or yo' an' me won't be not h in' much to each other no mo." "Bob. 1 won't make a fool of myself for a little senseless whim such as yours. I'll wear what I please, and if it don't exactly meet with your ideas of propriety you can go and round up a girl that's willing to put up with your nonsense." The little girl was angry now, and with a spiteful flirt of her suirts she turned from him and went into the house. Her anger was like a passing summer cloud, and when in a few mo ments it had spent itself she ran to her room, and, throwing herself on the bed, burst into tears. She knew Bob Taylor loved her dearly, and, rough and uneducated as he was, she almost worshiped the handsome young cowboy. She would gladly have con signed the offending article of dress to the waters of the Brazos, which ran near the house, but she eould not for a moment countenance each an unrea sonable whim on Bob's part, and with set teeth and clinched hands she owed that if her lover took her to be his wife the corset must be included in the inventory of her personal ef fects. Days sped by, and Bob passed and repassed her about the house, seem ingly as oblivious of her presence as if she were a thousand miles away. Only once did he notice her, when, in maid enly desperation at his coldness, she asked: "Ain't you never going to make up. Bob?" Not till you skin off that infernal pack saddle," was the surly reply. Their love had been a fruitful and never stale topie of conversation among the pupils of Miss Bentley's school for girls in Dallas, and in tjl their confidential chats Cassie had heard of" but one effective method of whipping a recalcitrant lover back into the traces: "Flirt with som other felhvw." . iler only fear was that if she should try the experiment Bob might lose control of his temper and fchoot the other fellow, and as a re sult he might be locked up for a long, long time in a cheerless prison and the marrJage be necessarily postponed tin til the misdemeanor was atoned for. The judge mijht be a cruel old mon ter with no sympathy for young lovers and might send him into retire fQSBt lor jews, and sha might become a wrinkled or ealcimined old maid be fore he again breathed the air of freedom. That would be terrible. But, pshaw! Bob would never be so foolish as to puff out a human light for one little girl in a country literally run ning over with the prettiest girls in America. Not he. Anyhow, he would risk it, and if Ben Allison, of the Diamond O ranch, came around and made eyes at her again as he had done on several occasions she would encourage him just the least bit, and then, when Bob recovered from the fit of temporary insanity into which her corset had thrown him and came to her in a penitent mood she would throw herself into his dear arms and tell him that she never did, never would i,and never could love anyone but him. Of course he would forgive her and kiss her tears away, and the sun of love would again burst forth and shice over them with new and ex quisite luster. . i Ben Allison's heart became real un- ruly when at hi6 next visit to the Den- j ton ranch Cassie met him with a wel- ' coming smile, extended her pretty lit- ' tie hand and permitted him to hold i ' quite a little while after he had got ; through shaking it. After this gra'.i- j fying reception his visits increased in frequency, and although, with great feminine tact, the girl kept his ardor j within proper bounds, 6he did not re- . pulse him, and it scon became noised j about among the riders ol the ranges j that "Ben was sure goin' to pitch a i matrimonial rope at Cassie Benton, ! an' the little threrbred 'd soon pack his brand." Bob noted all this, and his heart was , filled with bitterness toward his sup- posed rival- He never cast the look of j recognition upon Cassie. yev, when he j would see her moving about the house , or corrals or galloping aboul the range ; on her pretty little pinto pony, it be- j gantodawn upon him that ber cor- 6eted form was indeed far neater than j that of any girl -on all t:ie ranges of the Brazos. After a time he was ready , to swear that he had neter seen any- j thing one-half so handsome as that . neat, graceful figure, anJ the uncor- i seted girls of his acquaintance seemed j almost frightful ic his eyes when he gazed upon their loose, dumpy forms, i He began to harbor ths impression I that he had made a very pronounced fool of himself, but his stubborn na- i ture asserted itself. He had said the ' corset must go, and go it must. "That's a 'way-up-on-top gal sence j she got back from Dallas; ain't she, j Bob?" Allison said to him one day, ; when they met in the corral of the j Denton ranch. ! You don't want to make no funny i plays about that gal when I'm j around," Bob hotly replied. j "I hain't never yit found out that it j makes any difference who s around or who ain't around when I want to make j a talk play," retorted Allison- j "Some things gits found out mighty , Sudden, Ben Allison, an' this ain't j foin' to be fur from one of 'em. I want so tell you right now, an' to holler it ,mt plain, too, that yo are a nosin i round this ranch too plenty o' late in- 1 stead of ridin vour own ranch, an I ain't a goin to stand it no mo." "Mebbe you wouldn't mind tellin" jae what business it is o' yours whar' I ride. Long as the gal's throwed you to one side you ain't got no say as to other fellers pitchin' a rope at her." "Yer a liar when yo' 6ay she's throwed me. an yo know it, an' yo want to hit the Diamond O trail right now or you an' me's a-go in to bump together pow'f ul hard. Jest top that ho S3 o' yours an work him lively away from here, or a calamity's a-goiu to occur right quick." "You talk mighty brave fur a cast off shoe. Bob Taylor, an you can't be gin the bumpin business any too quick to suit me, yoa poor, worthless sneak." That was the limit. The two men, their eyes blazing with anger, backed away from each other, drawing their six-shooters as they went. The guns were thrown into position for quick work, just as a slight girlish form darted around the corner of the adobe stable and sprang in front of Taylor. Allison's pistol rang out before he noted the presence of the girl, and with a scream of pain she fell senseless to the ground.' The man who had fired the shot fled in terror, and Bob bent e ver his wonnded darling, calling her by the most endearing names and beg ging her to live for his sake. The form of the girl was borne into the house, and a doctor from Waco, who was fortunately there, attending a cowboy who was down with the break-bone fever, was called in. "Is she dead, doctor?" asked Bob, in tones of the most pitiable agony. "No, only stunned. Ball struck a eorset steel and glanced off. She will be all right soon, but it was a close call, my boy, and she undoubtedly saved your life." Cassie soon recovered consciousness, and. with joy in his every tone. Bob confessed what a fool he had been, and begged for forgiveness. Of course it was sweetly granted, and he de clared that the marriage must take place just as soon as she became able to stand before the minister. "And can I wear my corset, dear? she coyly asked. "Wear what saved yo fur me? Cas sie, I wouldn't have yon throw that away fur a million dollars. You kin wear two of m if yo' want to. an if yo' 6ay so I'll wear one myself." N. Y. Teiegram. A Tablet for a King. A tablet recently set up at Naples commemorates the bravest act done by a king in this century, the visit of King Humbert to the cholera sufferers in 1S84. It stands near the spot where the excommunicated king, Cardinal San Felice and the archbishop of Na ples met while passing through the hospital in the performance of their duties. La Moille river, in Vermont, was at first called La Monette, "the sea gull," from the great abundance of these birds. POPULAR SCIENCE THE NEW ARMY RIFLE. A National Guardsman Report Favor ably on It Wherein It Differ from the Remington Rifle Impression of a w York Soldier Who Baa Given It a Most Thorough Trial. "The United States army magazine rifle, model of 1893," has been de scribed often enough. Everyone knows that it is a five-shot magazine . rifle of thirty caliber. It is about two inches shorter than the Springfield and the Remington rifles, the calibers of which are forty-five and fifty respectively. It is a bolt gun, the breech being opened by a lever rising from the bolt at an angle of about thirty degrees to the REMINGTON CAB TIUDGK. KRAG-JORGEXSEJC CARTRIDGE. plane of the axis of tire rifle. But the little details of the piece are not so well knowp; and an enlisted man of the national guard of New York state, having obtained permission to try the piece at Creedmoor, makes public here with some of his impressions concern ing it. As has been said, the piece is a little shorter than the present rifle; but the breech block is so much longer than that of the Remington rifle that the barrel of the Krag-Jorgensen is about six inches " shorter. The barrel is heavier than that of the other piece. Immediately in front of the trigger the stock is grooved on both sides, like the stock of some of these sporting rifles which carry a magazine under the bar rel, and these grooves afford a good grip for the hand when firing the piece. The lever of the breech will prevent the piece from Wing "carried" as the present rifle is carried, with barrel to the rear; but if the manual of arms is changed.so that the barrel is to the front where now it is to the rear, the new piece will be easily handled. It is half a pound heavier than the present rifle, but it is better balanced, and my be shouldered as easily as the Remington. The breech lever being on the right side, the lockpla-te may be laid flat on the right shoulder when the piece is sjiouldered, though it is said to be ftie Intention of the board on regulations to alter the manual, so that "right shoulder arms' shall be a "slope arms." us "left shoulder arms" Is now. The butt plate is perfectly flat. The bayonet is not merely a toasting fork or fire poker, like the present im plement. It is a knife a foot long and weighing one and a half pounds to the one pound of the present bayonet. It can be used to cut wood or cheese, to throw up earthworks or build a field oven, and will stick an enemy as well as the old bayonet. It does not fit over the foresight as the present bayonet does; so that there will be no danger of twisting the sight in the hilarious excitement of fixing bayonets and stacking arms. The breach mechanism is remarkably simple; it consists of only four parts, the bolt and lever, the spring, the fir ing pin and the extractor. The trigger works with a spring, separately. There are four parts to the magazine the hinge, the spring which moves the feeder, and the door. It is in shooting, however, that the beauties of the new rifle show them selves. The foresight is on a stud fully half an inch high, while the rear sight is low, graduated from point blank at 300 yards to 600 yards before the leaf of the sight is raised, and thence to 2.500 yards. The bar of the sight is held in place by a spring, and allows for the "drift' of the bullet, but there is no allowance for wind, as in the Buflinton and Edwards sights. The trigger is short, and the guard will not admit two fingers. The trigger itelf has a "creep;" that is, it moves through a perceptible arc before it frees the hammer. This "creep" is the standard trigger pull of foreign rifles. It gives an excellent chance to aim and fire without disturbing the aim; for, hav ing taken a hasty aim, the trigger may be pressed until the "creep" is over; then a final aim may be taken, the trigger pressed a little more bang! the hammer is freed, the firing bolt comes home, and scree-ee! goes the bullet, 2,10o feet a second, with a range of a mile and i half and a trajectory Almost perfectly flat, until it hits some thing and makes its presence felt. The cartridge, the exact size of which is shown, is .30 of an inch in diameter and XI inches in length. It contains 30 grains of smokeless powder, the bul let weighing 220 grains. With the cry high foresight, it was found nec essary at 100 yards and 20O yards to aim entirely below the target; even then the shota were high. At 200 yards the lower edge of the target was aimed at- At 500 yards the bar of the sight was left a", the 300-yard mark and a "fine" sight taken on the bull's-eye, and at 000 yards the bar was raised to the 100-yal mark. In almost every case the shots were high. Out of some forty shots fired, only three were be below the middle of the target. Three shots missed; the other thirty-four were above the middle of the target. There was no perceptible recoil, and .btrlntely no smoksv N. Y. Son II m li i 1 d I a k la! 111 m iii I J SUBSTITUTE FOR STONE. Description and Composition or a Xw Building Material. The new kind of building material some time since announced as a pro posed substitute for ordinary stone or brick is now receiving special indorse ment on account of its freedom, under various und repeated tests, from the usual liability to crack or fracture. To insure this property, with the other es 6ential adaptations, silicic acid is used, powdered and cleansed from all im purities; five to ten per cent, of this is mixed in warm river or rain water, and this is applied to slacked or well burnt lime or added to hydraulic lime, the resulting product being mixed with sand and small portions of fluorspar. This mixture is-cast into molds in vari ous shapes as may be desired, and after removal the castings are left to dry from twelve to twenty-four hours, which brings them to a condition as dry as atmospheric air. In this state they are brought into a steam boiler and steam blown through so as to drive out all air, after which the boiler is hermetic ally sealed up and 6team let in under a pressure of ten atmospheres. In this high-pressure steam bath the stones re main from forty-eight to seventy-two hours, afterward being submitted to a bath of boiling and saturated chloride of calcium for six to twelve hours, also under a pressure of about ten at mospheres, in the same boiler, and the condensed water may be used for the bath. The -stones are allowed to dry in the open air, or, more quickly, by circulating steam inside the boiler after the chloride of calcium has leen withdrawn and prior to taking out the stones. Landscape Architect. CURB AND CONDUIT. Chicago Scheme for Burying Electric Wires at Moderate Cost. One of the few corporations in this country which, having occasion to run wires through public streets, shows a disposition to put those wires under ground furnishes electric light in Nor wood Park, a suburb of Chicago. And it has decided to make use lor mis pur pose of an invention of a man named Sampson, consisting of a combination of curbstone and conduit. One advan tage of such a plan is that the dnve wa v mav be left entirelv to the gas and water companies, and their pipes may be entirely aisregaraea in laying iao conduit. Moreover, it will not prob ably be necessary to dig so deep a trench as otherwise might be the case, although it is proposed to lay a tile and gravel drain, connecting with catuh basins and the city sewers, underneath the conduit. Blocks four feet in length and having a cross section such as is shown here with are placed about two feet apart at the edge of the sidewalk. These blocks are composed of concrete, and the tubes are of vitrified tiles. Similar tilts are carried across the gap be tween the blocks, being sustained and kept in place by mandrils reaching from duct to duct; and then the inter vening space is built up with a mixture of cement and concrete. A sheet-iron mold keeps the plastic material in shape until it sets; and a trowel is used to form and smooth the curbstone on top. Wherever it is desired to run a branch into a house or to a street light, T-shaped tiles are inserted in one of these gaps before filling in. The glossy inner surface of the duct offers little obstruction to the drawing in of the cables, and it is also waterproof. If the construction is properly conducted, therefore, the conduit should be thor oughly waterproof and practically in destructible. Of course, the system is as well adapted to wires for tele graphic, telephonic and power pur poses as to those for lighting. N. Y. Tribune. Violins Made of Aluminium. The idea of making violins out of aluminium is enough to cause the makers of the precious old Cremonas to turn in their graves. Aluminium violins, however, are being made, though they are, at all events, in this early stage of their manufacture, more remarkable for noise than for tonal beauty. The metal is not without ad vantages for the purpose. Sounding boards of aluminium do not produce secondary tones discordant with the primary tones and have not the uncer tainty and lack of individuality found in the wooden boards, nor the liability to warp and crack. The aluminium plates used must be riveted, not sol dered. The aluminium violin gives full and resonant tones, and experts say that it will be an acquisition to the orchestra, but it seems to lack the qualities necessary for the finest sold performances. ' Longevity on the Increase. There has been a decrease in the death rate of Great Britain since 1S59 at all ages under 55, while between the ages of C5 and 73 there has been an in crease. How the tje Operates. The eye adapts itself to view objects near and distant by a change in the curvatures of the crystalline lens. To Build a Channel Bridge. It is estimated that it would cost $170,000,000 to build a bridge across the English channel. RELIGIOUS MATTERS. LET ALL PRAISE HIM. Tualm 148. Halleluiah! Praise Jehovah! From the heavens in the heights: Praise Jehovah, all His angels. Praise Him, ull ye hosts of might. Praine Him. sun. with dazzling splendor; Praise Him, moon, that rul'st the night; Through creation wide extol Him: Praise Him, all ye stars of light. Heaven of heavens, praise Him, praise Him, All ye stars that float on high: Pouring down your crystal treasures From God's river in the sky. Let them praise His name: Jehovah. Spake the word, creation rose; He established them forever: Fixed their orbits as He chose. Praise Jehovah, lund and water: Dragons, monsters of the sea: Fire, and hail, and snow, and vapor; Storm wind, doing His decree. Praise Him, hills; and praise Him. mountains; Fruit-trees, cedars, praises sing: Praise Him. wild beast; praise Him, cattls! Praise Him. bird and creeping thing. Praise Him. kings: and praise Him, nation; Chieftains, judges of the earth: Toung men. maidens: old men. children: Praise ye Him with holy mirth. Let them praise Jehovah's greatness. For exalted Is His fame. Far above the earth and Heaven Shines the glory of His name High His people's horn is lifted. High their honor by His word: Vear to Him. and dear. 's Israel: Hallelujuh: Praise the Lord! Rev. U. D. Tompkins McLaughlin, la N Y Observer. WORD CRUSHING. Mighty EfTect of Words Carelessly or TCn kiudly Spoken. Up in the mountains of California and Navada they have a machine into which they pour car loads of rock, and it grinds them to powder. The object of this grinding is to get the gold out of the rock. It is there in minute par ticles and can not be separated until the quartz is crushed. The crushing enriches the minors and adds to the wealth of the world. But there is an other kind of crushing as old as the days of Job, which is like this in some respects, and yet, how unlike in others. It is as powerful as that in the mines but no gold is secured by its opera tions. Wherever it grinds it impov erishes. When the pious patriarch Was suffering "with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his erown" three friends, as they called them selves, came to comfort him. But they were such "miserable comforters" that he cried: "How long will ye vex my soul, and break me in pieces with words?" Yes, they brought their ma chine with them, and set it up beside the ash heap on which Job lay, and be gan to grind and grind, until their words were more painful than the boils. Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar have many successors in their business of breaking with words. Speech, which God gave to promote our happiness in society and the home alas! how often it is perverted to the crushing of hearts and hopes! See that fault-finding husband. When he married the meek-eyed maiden he promished to love and cherish her. But he begins at the breakfast table to criticise and complain. The coffee is weak, the eggs are too hard, the griddle-cakes lire heavy ajid cold. When she asks for money to buy meat and vegetables for dinner he is as cross as if she were trying to rob him. There is many a broken heart in our nominally Chris tian homes because we "lords of crea tion" become petty tyrants. The sav age beats his wife with a club to keep her submissive, but the word-beating civilized society is harder to bear. The Christian man ought to be a gentle man. And when a woman finds too late, that she has married a savage in broadcloth, her life is blighted, her very soul is crushed. Many a mother, wearied and worried, breaks the hearts of -her children with words. She is so fretful and impatient that they begin to think she does not love them, and without love child-life is as dreary as a desert. O, ye moth ers, do not scold the little ones every time that they drop a crumb on the floor, or rush into the house without wiping their feet. They are thought less, only. They do not mean to worry you. Remember that you were once a child. Remember, too, that gentleness is more effective than harshness in building up such characters as you want your children to have. Every community has its breakers with words. Solomon says: "The words of the tale-bearer are as wounds," and again, "there is that speaketh like the piercings of a sword. Words are but air articulated by the tongue and the lips, and yet when so articulated un der the influence of a cold and critical spirit thej" become as destructive as a cyclone. The professional gossip is a professional heart-crusher. And so is the proud self-righteous Pharisee who denounces the sinner in stead of trying to woo him by kind ness from his evil ways. Our divine Lord did not cry "Woe unto you pub licans and harlots;" but "Woe unto you Scribts and Pharisees, hypocrites." There are thousands of men and wom en in the gutter to-day who might be virtuous and happy if they were not trampled upon by the heel of respect ability. And there are word-breakers who are the modern fac-similes of Job's com forters. The go to the chamber of the suffering and talk and talk, until their well-meant but senseless prattle is harder to bear that the twinges of bodily pain or the scorchings of fever. They tell the impatient patients of all the sickness in the community and of those who have died of the very dis ease by which they are afflicted. The nurse of an invalid said to me some years ago: "Miss A. means to be kind, but every time she visits my patient she does her more harm than good. She not only wearies her bnt talks to her about the very things that are most distasteful and distressing to her." Why can not peo ple learn to be real comforters to those who are sick or in trouble instead of trying to break the spirit that is al ready like a bruised reed? I have known men who might be called prayer-meeting crushers. They talk so long and in such a rambling, repeti tious way, that they exercise the spirit of devotion and of brotherly love. It is hard to be charitable to one who says that he wants to edify ua and then dis gusts us. Such men may be zealous and sincere, but they are like the breth ren at Corinth about whom Paul wrote in his first epistle, who spake in an un known tongue.,. They did not edify and comfort their hearers. When a man finds that he can not interest his brethren and sisters in the prayer meeting, he had better not try to speak. That is one of the cases in which silence is golden. Obadiah Old school, in Chicago Interior. TRUE THANKSGIVING. We Too Often Forget the Real Meaning Behind Our National Holidays. How far do we really give thanks on Thanksgiving day? It is a question which applies, more or less, to all me morial days. Do we, as a rule, think more of Christ at Christmas than on other days? Does that national an niversary, the Fourth of July, recall national history, especially in that sig nificance which was originally intend ed, more than anjr other day of the year? Doubtless each of these serves as a reminder in some more or less vague and general way; yet the ques tions just set down appear to be perti nent, after all. The tendency of memorial observ ance is to become something else than properly memorial. As the years glide by the event so commem orated retires into the more and more distant past, and in the same proportion grows faded and dim. In the years immediately following the institution of Thanksgiving by the Pil grims, it may be presumed that appre ciation of what harvest means where famine had prevailed or threatened, was vivid and warm. As each year brought round the same abounding tribute of the soil to the hand that tilled it, tradition would recall the time when such a kindly gift from "the mother of us all" was welcomed at Plymouth as life from the dead. With this might naturally go a keener sense of indebtedness to Him, who through instrumentalities of rain and sunshine and soil feeds His children indebted ness not only for this, but for count less mercies besides. So it may have been for some generations, nas lapse of time wrought lapse of memory? It may be that the special signifi cance of Thanksgiving is not always kept in mind. It is a thanksgiving for the seedtime and the harvest; for the blessing granted to human labor in its tilling of the soil, and so providing abundance of that store of natural product upon which not alone human life, but so much of what concerns human labor and enterprise in other spheres must depend. Even the thanksgiving meal,, with its loadedtable and its happy and eager participants, has a significance lifting it out of the category of mere enjoyment. It is the symbol of abundance; of that abundance which came after famine when the devout Pilgrim, with his" harvest safely gath ered home, could thankfully and joy fully look forward to impending win ter no longer with dread least the wolf of hunger should be heard barking at the door. On Thanksgiving day let the poor b remembered. Let some opportunity of genuine Cnristian beneficence be used; let it be used as thankfully and gladly as the abundance of another year of seed-sowing ani harvest is welcomed and enjoyed. God has -taught us that the offering of thankful hearts is peculiarly pleasing to Him, and that to such offerings His blessing will espe cially be given. Chicago Standard. Reading God's Messaces.- The old Greeks used to send messages from one army to another by means of a roll of parchment twisted spirally round a baton, and then written upon. It was perfectly unintelligible when it fell into a man's hands that had not a corresponding baton to twist it upon. Many of Christ's messages to ns are like that. You can only understand the utterances when life gives you the frame round which to wrap them, and then they flash up into meaning, and we say at once: "He told ns it all be fore, and I scarcely knew that He told me. until this moment when I need it-, Alexander Maclaren. Sorrow as Praise. When sudden sorrow befalls the) Christian, the last thing that he needs to know is why he has been chosen for stroke. The first thing that he needs to learn is, how can he glorify God through and by affliction. If he must know why he was afflicted peculiarly, it is enough that God loved him. And this is reason enough for making sor row a pean of praise. S. S. Times. Why We Snail at TLaat Obtain. The Christian Is sure that he will hold on his way, and at last receive the crown of glory, not because of his own strong desire and purpose, bat be cause he belongs to Christ. United Presbyterian. THE FINEST OF THE WHEAT. Pithy Sayings Cleaned From the Columns of the Ram's Horn. Saying no to self is saying yes to God. God never fails to promote the faith ful worker. Only when God honors us are we truly exalted. The most dangerous evil is the one that looks most harmless. Try not only to be good, bnt to be good for something. It is a great misfortune to be blind to our own faults. In most cases the reformer goes a way from home to begin work. Unless you seek your treasures out side of this world you will never be truly rich. The world needs men who will do right, no matter what is to come of it. . If able preaching eould have saved the world, the devil would have beers traveling on foot long ago. If you have to shout to tell people that you are religious, there are many who will never find it out.