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About The Sioux County journal. (Harrison, Nebraska) 1888-1899 | View Entire Issue (July 22, 1897)
SAFETY FOR CITIES. REV. DR. TALMAGE PREACHES ON MUNICIPAL WELFARE. Ke DheniM the Cities mad Towns of Ibis Coaatry froas a Moral and Ht-Ua-ioas Ktaedpoint-Connael to Thoae Who Hold Pablic Position. Talka oa Town. . Thia sen, on of Dr. Taliuage discusse t.om a mo- 'I and religious standpoint the welfare of -.l the towui and cities of our country, IiU text is Ezekiel xiviL, 3, "O thou that art situate at the entry of the ear This ia a part of an impassioned apos trophe to the city of Tyre. It was a beau tiful city a majestic city. At the east end of the Mediterranean it sat with one hand beckoning the inland trade and with the other the commerce of foreign na tions. It swung a monstrous boom across its harbor to shut out foreign enemies and then swung back that boom to let in Ita friends. The air of the desert was fra grant with the spices brought by cara vans to her. fairs, and all seas were cleft into foam by the keels of her laden mer chantmen Her markets were rich with horse and mules and camels from Togar mah; with upholstery and ebony and ivory from Dedan; with emeralds and agate and coral from Syria; with wine from Helbon; with finest needlework from Ashnr and Chihnad. Talk about th splendid staterooms of your Cunard and Inman and White Star lines of interna tional steamers why, the benches of the staterooms in those Tyrian ships were all ivory, and instead of our coarse canvas on the mast of the shipping, they had the finest linen, quilted together and in wrought with embroideries almost miracu lous for beauty. Its columns overshadow ed all notions. Distant empires felt its heart bent. Majestic city, "situate at the entry of the sea." But where now is the gleam of her tow ers, the roar of her chariots, the masts of her shipping? Let the fishermen who dry their nets on the place where she once J stood, let the sea that rushes upon the barrenness where she once challenged the admiration of all nations, let the barbar ians who build their huts on the place where her palaces glittered, answer the question. Blotted out forever! She for got God, and God forgot her. And while oor modern cities admire her glory let them take warning at her awful doom. ( 'l he Tr irst City. Cain was the founder of the first city, and 1 suppose it took after him in morals. It is a long while before a city can get over the character of those who founded it. W'ei'e ihey criminal exiles, the filth, and the prisons, and the debauchery, are the shadows of such founders. New York will not lor 20U or StH) years escape from the good influences of its founders, the pious settlors whose prayers went up from the very streets where now banks dis count, and brokers shave, and companies declare dividends, and smugglers swear custom house lies, and above the roar of the drays and the crack of the auc tioneers' mallets is heard the ascription. "We worship thee, O thou almighty dol lar!" The church that once stood on Wall street still throws its blessing over all the scene of traffic and upon the ships that fold their white wings in the harbor. Orig inally men gathered in cities from neces sity. It was to escape the incendiary' torch or the assassin's uugger. Only the very poor lived in the country, those who had nothing that couid be stolen or vaga bonds who wanted to be near their place of business, but since civilization and re ligion have made it safe for men to live almost anywhere men congregate in cities because of the opportunity for rapid gain. Cities are not necessarily evils, as has sometimes been argued. They have been the birthplace of civilization. In them popular liberty has lifted up its voice. Wit ness. Genoa and Pisa and Venice. The entrance of the representatives of the cities Jii the legislatures of Europe was the deathblow to feudal kingdoms. Cities are the patronizers of art and literature architecture pointing to its British mu seum in London, its Hoyal library in Paris, its Vatican in Rome. Cities hold the world's scepter. Africa was Carthage, Greece was Athens. England is London. France is Taris, Italy in Home and the citiea in which God has cast our lot will yet decide the destiny of the American people. At this season of the year 1 have thought it might be useful to talk a little while about the moral responsibility lest Sng upon the office bearers in all our cities, theme as appropriate to those who are governed as to the governors. The moral character of those who rule a city has much to do with the character of the city itself. Men, women and children are al! interested in national olitics. When th.j great presidential election comes, every patriot wants to be found at the ballot hoi. We are all interested in the discus sion of national finance, national debt, and we read the laws of Congress, and we are wondering who will sit next in th presidential chair. Now, that may be all rery well is very well. But it is hij.'h time that we took some of the attention which we have been devoting to national affairs f.ud brought it to the study of mu nicipal government This it seems to me ww is the chief point to be taken. Make the cities right and the nation will be right I have noticed that, according to their opportunities, there has really been tore corruption in municipal governments ia thia country than in the State and na tional legislatures. Now, is there no hope? With the mightiest agent in our hand, the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ, shall not II oor cities he reformed and purified and redeemed"' I believe the day will come. I am In full sympathy with those who are apposed to carrying politics into religion, feat oar citiea will never be reformed and purified until we carry religion into poli tics. I look over our cities and I see that all great Interests are to be affected in the fsture, as thy hare been affected in the past, by the character of those who in the differ at departments rule over as. and 1 froooa fa classify some of those interest. , - Coansaercial Kthlca. la the first place, 1 remark commercial ttaiaa are always affected by the moral or twitrsl character of those who have mu tkiml sepresaaey. Officials that wink at f?asJ aft that hare neither censure nor t:ifKBt for fHtterlac dishonesties al st twin the pals of commercial trm.'- Etery shop, every store, every f 'rt, M7 factory la the cities feels a-kl Aasaieaia a thai 4t kail If U f 7 t. j t"sare b a diefaonest mayoralty. ' r r MrtMipM eoouaon council, or a 1 1 -rible to bribes, in that city 1 t W aaKasHed license for all V it '.art M .ate, while, oa the tV -fa art faithful to their U i i taw are aregcptly executed, if thre is vigilance in tgurd to the oulbranchings of crime, there is the highest protection for all bargain making. A merchant may stand in his store and ay: "Now, I'll have nothing to do with city politics. I will not soil ruy hands with the slush." Nevertheless the most insignificant trial in the police court will affect that merchant directly or indirectly. What style of clerk issues the writ? What style of constable makes the arrest? What style of attorney issues the plea? vVhat style of judge charges the jury? What style of sheriff executes the sentence? These are questions that strike your counting rooms to the center. You may not throw it off. In the city of New York Christian merchants for a great while said, "We'll have nothing to do with the management of public affairs," and they allowed everything to go at loose ends un til there rolled up in that city a debt of nearly $10,ou0,m. The municipal gov ernment becanie a hissing and a byword in the whole earth, and then the Chris tian merchants saw their folly, and they went and took possession of the ballot boxes. I wish all commercial men to un derstand that they are not independent of the moral character of the men who rule over them, but must be thoroughly, might ily affected by them. So also of the educational interests of a city. Do you know that there are in this country about 70,000 common schools, and that there are over 8,000,000 pupils, and that the majority of those schools ami the majority of those pupils are in our cities? Now, this great multitude of chil dren will be affected by the intelligence or ignorance, the virtue or the vice of boards of education and boards of con trol. There are cities where educational affairs are settled in the low caucus in the abandoned parts of the cities by men full of ignorance and rum. It ought not to be so, but in many cities it is so. 1 bear the tramp of coming generations. What that great multitude of youth shall be for this world anu the next will be affected very much by the character .of your public schools. You had better multiply the moral arfd religious influences about tht common schools rather than subtract from them, Instead of driving the Bible out you had better drive the Bible further in. May God defend our glorious common school system and send into rout and con fusion aU its sworn enemies. City (.flic ala. I have also to say that the character of officials in a city affects the domestic cir cle. In a city where grogshops bavetheir own way and gambling bells are not in terfered with, and for fear of losing polit ical influence officials close their eyes to fostering abominations in all those cities the home interests need to make implora tion. The family circles of the city must inevitably be affected by the moral char acter or the immoral character of those who rule over them I will go further and say that the reli gious interests of a city are thus affected. The church to-day has to contend with evils thru the civil law ought to smite, and, while I would not have the civil gov ernment in any wise relax its energy in the arrest and punishment of crime, 1 would have a thousandfold more energy put forth in the drying up of ihe foun tains of iniquity. The church of God asks no pecuniary aid from political power, but docs ask that in addition to all the evils we must necessarily contend against we shall not have to fight also municipal neg ligence. Oh, that in all our cities Chris tian people would rise up, and that they would put their hand on the helm before piratical demagogues have swamped the ship! Instead of giving so much time to national politics, give some of your atten tion to municipal government I demand that the Christian people who have been standing aloof from public af fairs come back, and in the might of God try to save our cities. If things are or have l)een bad, it is because good people have let them be bad. That Christian man who merely goes to the polls and casts his vote does not do his duty4. It is not the ballot box that decides the election; it is the political caucus, and if at the pri mary meetings of the two political par ties unfit and bad men are nominated, then the ballot box has nothing to do save to take its choice between two thieves. In our churches, by reformatory organiza tion, in every wsy let us try to tone up the moral sentiment in these cities. The rul ers are those whom the people choose, and depend upon it that in all the cities, as long as pure-hearted men stand aloof from politics because they despise hot partisanship, just so long in many of our cities will rum make the nominations, and rum control the ballot box, and rum inaugurate the officials. I take a step further in this subject and ask all those who believe in the omnipo tence of prayer, day by day and every day, present your city officials before God for a blessing. If you live in a city presided over by a mayor, pray for him. 1 he chief magistrate of a city is in a position of great -responsibility. Many of the kings and jneeiis and emperors of other days had no such dominion. With the scratch of a pen he may advance a beneficent in stitution or balk a railway confiscation. By appointments he may bless or curse every hearthstone in lhe city. If in the Episcopal chui-'-hes, by the authority of the litany, and in our non-episcopnte churches we every Sabbath pray for the President of the Tinted States, why not, then, be just ns hearty in our supplica tions for the chief magistrates of cities, for their guidance, for their health, for their present and their everlasting mor ality? The Common Conncil. But go further, and pray for your eo.n mon council, if your city has a common council. They hold in their hands a power splendid for good or terrible for evil. They have many temptations. In many of the cities whole boards of com mon rot-noil men have gone down in the maelstrom of political, corruption. They could not stand the power of the bribe. Corruption came in and sat beside them, and sat behind them, and sat before them. They recklessly voted away the hard earned moneys of the people. They were brought out, body, mind and soul, so that at the ei.d of their term of office they had not enough of moral remains left to make a decent funeral. They went Into office with the huzza of the multitude. They came out with tho anathema of all decent people. There is not one r.ian out of a hundred that cnu endure th temptations of the common council men in our great cities. . If a man in that position have the courage cf a Cromwell, and the Indepen dence of nn Andrew Jackson, and the public spiritedncs of a John Frederick Oberlin. and the piety of an Edward I'ay soii. he will have no surplus to throw sway. 1'iay for these men. Every man likes to he prayed for. Do yon know how Dr. Norman Mr Levi became the queen's chaplain? It was by a wnrm hearted prayer In tb Scotch kirk, In behalf of th ror family, one Sabbath when the queen and her iB were present incognito. The Police. Yes, j.o further, my friends, and pray for your police. Their perils and tempta tions best known to themselves. They hold the order aud peace of your cities in their grasp. But for their intervention you would not be safe for an hour. They must face the storm. They must rush in where it seems to them almost instant death. They must put the hand of arrest on the aimed maniac and corner the mur derer. They must refuse large rewards for withdrawing complaints. They mast unravel intricate plots aud trace dark labyrinths of crime and develop suspi cions into certainties. They must be cool while others are frantic. They must be vigilant while others are somnolent, 'im personating the very villainy they want to seize. In the police forces of our great cities are to-day men of as thorough char acter is that of the oldest detective of New Y'ork, addressed to whom there came letters from London asking fur help ten years after he was dead letters addressed to "Jacob if a yes. High Con stable of New Y'ork." Your police need your appreciation, your sympathy, your gratitude and, above all, your prayers. Y'ea, I want you to go further and pray every djy for prison inspectors and jail keepers, work awful aud beneficent. Hough men, cruel men, impatient men, are not fit for those places. They have under their care men who were once as good as you, but they got tripped up. Bad company or strong drink or strange con junction of circumstances flung them headlong. Go down that prison corridor and ask them how they got in and about their families and what their early pros pects in life were, and you will find that they are very much like yourself, except in this, that God kept you while he did not restrain them. Just one false step made the difference between them and you. They want more than "prison bars, more than jail fare, more than handcuffs and hopplers, more than a vermin cover ed couch to reform them. Pray God day by day that the men who have these un fortunates in charge may be merciful, Christianly strategic and the means reformat icn and rescue. God's Representatives. My word now is to all who may come to hold any public position of trust in any city: You are God's representatives. God, the Kiug and Kuler and Judge, sets you in his place. Oh, be faithful in the dis charge of all your duties, so that when all our cities are in ashes, and the world itself is a red scroll of flame, you may be in the mercy and grace of Christ rewarded for your faithfulness. Y'ou may make rewards of eternity the emoluments of your ollice. What care you fo' adverse political criticism if you have God on your side? The one, or the two, or the three years of your public trust will pass away, and all the years of your earthly service, and then the tribunal will be lifted before which you and 1 must appear. May God make you so faithful now that the last scene shall be to you exhilaration and rapture! I wish now to exhort all good people, whether they are the governors or the governed, to make one grand effort for the salvation, the purification, the redemption of our Ameri can cities. Do you not know that there are multitudes going down to ruin, tem poral and eternal, dropping quicker than words drop from my lips? Grogshops swallow them up. Gambling bells devour them. Houses of shame are damning them. Oh, let us toil and pray and preach and vote until all these wrongs are right ed! What we do we must do quickly. With our rulers, and on the same plat form, we must at last come before the throne of God to answer for what we have done for the bettering of our great towns. Alas, if on that day it be found that your hand has been idle and my pulpit has been silent! O ye who are pure and hon est and Christian, go to work and help to make the cities pure and honest and ' Christian! Lest it may have been thought that I am addressing only what are called the better classes, my final word is to some dissolute soul to whom these words may come. Though you may be covered with all crimes, though you may be smitten with all leprosies, though you may have gone through the whole catalogue of in iquity and may not have been in church for twenty years, you may have your na ture entirely reconstructed, and upon your brow, hot with infamous practices aud besweated with exhausting indul gences, God will place the flashing coronet of a Saviour's forgiveness. "Oh, no!" you say. "If you knew who I am and where I came from, you wouldn't gay that to me. I don't believe the gospel you are preaching speaks of my case." Yes, it does, my brother. And then, when you tell me that 1 think of what St. Teresa said when reduced to utter destitution. Having only two pieces of money left, she jingled the two pieces of money in her hand and said, "St. Teresa and two pieces of money are nothing, bnt St. Te resa and two pieces of money and God arc all things." And 1 tell you now that while a sin and a sinner are nothing, a siu and a sinner and an all forgiving and all compassionate God are everything. Who is that that I see corning? 1 know his step. I know his rags. Who is it? A prodigal. Come, people of God; let us go out and meet him. Get the best role you can find in all the wardrobe. Let the an-1 gels of God fill their chalices and drink to ' his eternal rescue. Come, people of God; let us g out and meet him. The prodi- j pal is coming home. The dead is alive hgain. and the lost is found. Pleased with the news, the saints below In songs their tongues employ; Beyond the skies the tidings go, And heaven is filled with joy. . Nor angels can their joy contain, But kindle with Dew fire; "The sinner lost U found," they sing, And strike the sounding lyre. Short Sermons. Immigration. In no rewpect deserves our country the name of new EWorld better than In regard to the determina tion of fhe founders of our constitution J to keep out mid banian forever the Old WorW'a distinction of clauses and rank and principalities and dominion. KabW Gutttav GotthHI, Hebrew, New York City. Confidence In God. What Is It that makes the rich tnnn look down upon the poor witti fear? Why Is It that the poor man looks with envy upon the rich man and wishes to resort fo revo-' lutlonary measures for the even distri bution of God's goods? It la all through want of confidence In Ood. Her, John Scully, Catholic, Philadelphia, Pa. I Russia has'tbe moat rapidly Inereaav ' Ing population off toy country In taw world, p . ' , . .i i HE is a young doctor and a sur geon on lxard one of the small gunboats placed on a great Af rican lake. Fresh-colored still, though s!ighUy tanned by exosure to the lake winds, with merry, Irish eyes of blue gray, a sqna re-cut jaw and obstinate chlii, a long upper lip, a little whisker at the temple and short wiry black brown hair. Like many men of his c!:;ss, he is a potential Darwlu, aud, having no means to travel and study natural history, has entered the navy as a surgeon. He has landed on the shores of the lake for a day's shooting, hoping to get au elephant at least, but meantime content to study sunbirds. Let us In Imagination enter his in I ml. W'e through bin eyes what he saw and lay bare his thoughts. Grass' a forest of grass, with stout, knotted sterns six or eight feet high, and abundant leaves starting from ev ery joint. Each stem eud.s In a droop ing plume of ripened seed. As the doctor forces his way through the tan gled herbage aud catie-llke stalks the seeds shower down upon him, each ou- steadied in Its descent by Its long feath ery stipule. The weds are sharp point ed and barbed at the ends, so they pierce their way through his khaki clothing easily and scratch the per spiring flesh beneath. This raises to exasperation the discomfort already felt to Ik? well-nigh unls-arable, for the doctor's face is now the color of raw beef from the stifling heat and the frightful exertion of forcing bis way through such a thicket of grass, and hU bauds are scratched and cut hy contact with the razor-edgi'd leaven. His Terai hat is constantly being dragged off bis head and It Is all he can do to carry his gun and ellmw his way through the obstructing heritage, pro tecting his. face as well as isMtslblc with the left baud. So lie Is in an ill tem per aud cannot stop to notice the weav er birds of flame color and black, the extraordinary stick insects (exactly simulating stalks of grass! and the green, leaf-like uiantises which throng the dense brake ou either side. He hi after bigger game. The most exjK--rienced of bis boys pioneers bitu through the stifling grajis jungle, anoth er lsjy with a second rifle follows be hind. The idii Is "elephant," ele phants having Ix-en reported hereabout the previous day, when suddenly (they have reached a mm.ee where the gras Is a little' drier, a Utile less dense) the pioneer "lxy" comes doubling lack on hU master with every gesture express ive of "Hush!" The dcxtor stojw, mops his boiling face (thankful for the mo mentary hah) and asks inquiringly: "Elephants?" "No," says the negro In a panting whlper. "Lion! There, Uere; no, not there. You see that ant hill? Well, climb on to Its side and you will see the Hou lying In a clear space just beyond. A male lion, truly; its body H nearly white aud lt mane is black." With Express rifle at full cock, the doctor advances gingc-rly through the Interlaced grass, bent nearly double, keeping the muzzle of the gun directed straight lx-fore him and shields its sen sitive trigger from the intrusive grass sunns. The ant ldll Is reached; he clam bers to Its sloping Bide. "Good God, the boy's right. What a beauty! And asleep, too!" But something in the doc tor's coming ha aroused the Hon, not ten yards away; aroused him partially, for there Is a sudden movement. He raised the great head set la a collar of yellow, brown, black mane; slowly the dim nictitating membrane, passes over the yellow eye, but as they are focus ing to meet his own gaze the doctor fires, flws precipitately (his position on the sloping ant hill la Insecure), wounds the Hon somewhere, somehow, but does not kill him. The beat. gives a sharp explosive roar, seems to jump Into the air with all four feet and then In three bounds ha crashed off Into Uiu grass jungle. Hllcnce. "Well, I'm a muff!" thinks the doctor. "He wawj't ten yards away aud I didn't kill him dead! I don't know quite where I hit him; In the client, I think. But he can't be far away and I must finish him off." He descends from the ant hill Into the clear trampled space where the lion had been iyfng. At the spot where the beast had made its first Isiund into the dense grans hedge there In a great squirt of blood over the tangled green erythe dark crimson liquid still drips from leaf blade to leaf blade. "Ah! thought so; he must be pretty badly hit." , Two black faces, with atarttng eyes anil anxious grins, now cautiously pr around the ant hill. The dxtor, rais ing his head, recognize his boys and beckons Umin down. The three con verse in whispers. The situation la ex ,plalncdhow the lion was wounded, the direction In which he bounded awny. The Iwya urge caution. "Lion plenty fierce. Mkango tnkaJI nditn. Master must take care; better climb tree and look all around not go iuto grass." But there Is no free anywhere near. A boy hoists himself to the slen der summit of the ant bill and reports that be sees the graae moving In the direction whlMier the Hon had withdrawn-moving as though a sta tionary animal were shaking It with ctovulslve throes (all of which la ex plained more by gestures than by words). The doctor, claiuberiiig up lie sUle the boy, thinks be can descry (as the grass stems liow and droop before some writhing object) the lion's wav ing tall and a yellow-gray haunch. He tires, descends from the aut hill to re load. A rush comes through the grass, a deafening roar, some gTeat yellow object In the air atove lilm . momentarily dark against the sky yellow eyes (insensibility). " 'Click clock, click dock, click clock wonder what that funny sound is am I In a train? No, It is the engines of the steamer or Is It the pulse beating in my tiMnples? They have lx-en axWp, and in broad day light, with the blue sky above me and In the broiling sun! How foolish! But no It must be something more. I know there has something ha-imened let me think iOU( cf course a lion jumped at mc. Then I must be wounded? Ixt's s-e" (raises himself painfully on his right arm) "My God! a pool of my own blood rny 4eft arm has no feel Ing chewed by the lion, hand almost detached, rest of arm a mass of blood, muscle, bone and khaki Oh, God! I'm going to die can't live he bus torn open my stom ach that must be the pan creas. I'm like a butcher's shop." (Whimpers. A blublx'ring sound at tracts his attention.) "Hullo! you here, .Tuma? Plucky chap: thought you'd have cut and ran. Where's Said!? Eh? Ssak louder. I'm deaf oh, gone to guulwmt; quite right What? the lion?" (funis bis head slight ly) "there, still living; looks pretty sick too." , (The lion is lying four yards away, partly on his side, one crippled forepaw turned back, the other out-; stretched and'the great head resting on it, eying the men with solemn yellow eyes no longer fierc-e, the pupil' shrunk to a pin-point. With each convulsive shudder of the lion's lody the Mood km1 round him widens slightly.) . "By heaven, If I've got to die, I'll die like a man, and he shall go flrsit. Who can tell? He might recover and hurt the boy. See here, Juina" (to Junta, who Is "SOME CHEAT YELLOW OBJECT supporting his Istck), "nt very gentle, take a cartridge out of my belt, put It In the rifle so; now mind my arm now, give lue the rifle iu my right baud' and come tMwecn my legs MJ stoop very low down, like that. Now I'm )foing to rest the rifle on your shoul der and take aim. Keep rery still. I won't hurt you keep still I'll aim Just below the brute's eyes. (A minute pause. Bang! Ioctor falls back fainting. Lion stretches oiU his bead three times with spasmodic upward movement, the tail and the limbs all but the crijipled one stiffen, ttie claws stand out from their sheaths and beust dies.) "Juuia, is that you? Water, how delicious! more and on my forehead so what a brick you arel Upon my word, I'd like to leave you something. Juiua. Y'ou must tell them that 1 said so, you know, for stU-klug by me. God bless you! Is the lion dead?" (The sobbing boy mxls "Yes.") "Well, then, I 'mu.it die too. I'm enough of a doctor to know that, Don't try. Tell them I bore It like a man. But It's ls.astly hard! Who'd have thought my day's shooting would have ended like this?" (Whimpers.) "Beastly hard. I'm so young, and I've done so well up to now am) there's mother. Who will break It to her? She'll never g-t over It and Lily aud, damn It all, I can't even send them messages! How can one tell such things to a black hoy? S'pose I'm dying primarily fromjJiB shock know I'm dying somo how can't raise my laad to look Mother! MotLert . What rot to go on like that, as If It could do uiiy good! Now, lis ten. Ine ndlrlnl a ma I, mil ml on go, Iwe h, God! How can I teil film? It's all slipping away from tne. For the blood Is fhe life. Where have I heard that? That blots la the lite slipping away-allp- plcgaway I must lie In a boat. It Is so soothing: np ami down, up and down; so restful." (Sighs gently. Dies.)-Sir H. U. Johnston, ia the Sat urday Kevlew. PEARL FARM THAT PAYS. Only One in th World, bnt It Yield a Hindwne Herrnne. There Is said to lie only one pearl farm iu the world, but that pays IU proprietor handsomely. This farm la in the Torres Strait at the northern extremity of Australia, ami Is-longs to James Clark, of Queensland. Mr. Clark, who Is known as "the king of the pearl fishers." originally stocked it with 150,- 000 pearl oysters. Now 1h men 200 of whom are divers aud 2T0 vessela are -employed In harvesting the crop. "I have lieen fifteen years engaged Id pearl fishing," Mr. Clark told a i-orre-siKindent of the Melbourne Age. "My exiwrlence has led me to the belief that, with proper Intelligence In the se lection of a place, one can raise pearls and pearl, shells as easily as one can raise oysters. I started my farm three yeurs ago, and have stocked It with shells which I obtained In many ln-smiu-es far out at sea. My pearl shell farm covers 500 square miles. Over most of It the water is shallow. In shal low water shells attain the largest size. 1 ship ray pearls to London In my own vessels. The catch each year nine, roughly speaking, from 40,000 worth up to almost five times that amount" Rochester (X. Y.) Times. In Silver Paper. I wonder if the men who pop the mo mentous question only to receive a negative, feel' particularly awkward when tiiey meet the woman who dec-lined the honor. The proper observa tion, I understand, for the lady to make after the painful and delicate duty haa been performed is, "But I trust we shall remain friends." The man may shake his bead and mutter, "Friends be hanged!" bnt there Is no help for It. Aa they move In the same set they can not avoid meeting each other, and of course in a friendly way. It Is only In a very much lower rank In society that the rejected one swears that no other man shall have his beloved object, and buys a second-hand revolver to pre vent It Just at firxt it must be very embarrassing, and there Is probably al ways a certain queer feeling lmtween fhem as of a semi-attached couple who might have ls-en one for life but for that monosyllable and scarcely articu late "No." As a matter of fact, she never does say "No," but wraps up the negative, a It were, in silver paper, f'l respect and 'honor yqij, Mr. .Jones" (who hoped to be called. "Ed-win") "be yond everything, but what you ask can never he." A Devoted I toy at Couple. The devotion of the venerable king and queen 'of Denmark Is described nil positively touching. During the' time of the Queen's Illness, which last ed something like' three months, no one about the court was allowed U) soe hej- 5 THE A Hi ABOVE HIM. save heir husband, a lady In walling and the physician 'Iji ordinary. The King was ceaseless in his devotion. He rarely went out, save when duty compelled him, abandoned' ills custom ary exercise, and punsed hours every day rewdlng to his wife or playing cards and chess with her, and tolling her what was going on In the world outside. The long attention from bis, walks and ride, his constant attnhd-' auce uitfi the invalid -who, hnpplJy, recovered In spr'.ng-told rather heav ily on the KUi, and In turn affected his health. The Quetm seldom ajpeor In public. OnxniioTLies to her, as to the PrinccM of Wales, have always bcm cereinoiu'ea from which site preferred to CHcape unless duty-absolutely called her. 'Of' a lirlght and most youthful disposition, she llkos to have gay and luippy folk alsmt her. ... "I can't tx-mr to see loig faces nea. toe, she Mill declare. Of their numerous grandchildren. lslh King and Queen aw ImnienseJy ' fond, and ant-seen' walking aliout with them hand m hand at Copenhagen'. - " . . A Wroau nppoitlon. ' "The p-oJe moved out of that boose this morning aud thai Is Ore landlord JuM going in." ' . ' "He appears to have' a great man proHttecUre tenants." V "Prop-et1ve tenant, Indeed! They are oftly neighbors goliif to sec In what condition the js-ople left the house.'! Iondon Eun. ...... '- iratiiaei ' 'v ; ' "Do you know what you ttrt?;,tfymg to soy," aiked rli,e, financial littflilndr, "when you ncak of a man gfoliig to an untimely grave at the age of Ho?" ' . "I do," said the uTidaunted obituarist "The old villain ought fo have gone there forty yeare ago'-Clnclnnatl En. qiilrer. Men do not b-arn half aa much by e petieiicv aa they should.