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About The Loup City northwestern. (Loup City, Neb.) 189?-1917 | View Entire Issue (May 17, 1906)
Ill THE METROPOLIS SOME MORE WORK OF THE WICKED AUTOMOBILES. LIVING OVER A CRATER. The Risks Attendant on New York Civilization—At the Metropolitan Museum—Monetary Values of Paintings. EW work.—It is quite possible, I think, that Vesu vius and San Francisco- had something to do with New York’s sudden deter mination not to be blown up any more. For a long time the city has been subject to disagreeable eruptions, some of them fatal, most of them seriously damaging. They come out of the bowels of the earth —out of the entrails of the city to be unpleasantly exact. Manholes blew up, windows were shattered, street cars and cabs were thrown over, limbs were mangled. No man could tell when he would see his fellow man rising in the air, if he did not have the ill luck to rise in the air himself. The sewers were on the rampage and investigation showed that the wicked automobile, which does so much damage on the surface, was to blame for this sub-surface dis turbance. The garages were emptying gasoline into the sewers and the liberated gases were doing the rest A vast section of the town began to feel as if it were living over a crater. At last the aldermen have taken the matter up and it is to be an of fense against the town to empty gas oline into a sewer under any cir cumstances whatever. The new statute may be obeyed. It would be very difficult to catch of fenders. But New York breathes easi er. One peril seems to have been removed. Many remain. It has been figured out that there are a hundred different ways of being killed in New York. Probably the figures are con servative. The Pennsylvania railroad excavators for the across-New York subway alone represent enormous op portunities for killing. Twenty-four doctors are in the relay system of first aid and many accidents are recorded in a single day. Civilization as New York sees it comes high. Home-Coming of a Mastodon. NE day, some mil lions of years ago, a mastodon, tired of fighting the ice, and grown old enough to retire, laid down and died near the New York city of to day. In the mid dle of the last century they found Ids bones. His legs were so much like those of men that a great cry went up of the dis covery of the remains of a race of giants. “There were giants in those days.” i But when all the bones were put together it was found that they were not human. The mastodon stood forth, the biggest of all mastodons. The head and 16-foot tusks alone weighed—in the bones—a thousand pounds. The great skeleton went into the Spencer collection of Boston, and the Spencer will kept the collection in tact for 50 years. Now Pierpont Mor gan has bought the mastodon for $30, 000 and presented it to the Metropoli tan museum here. So that the masto don is home again—back to his old New York haunts. He is a wonder to behold, and the metropolis will soon have an opportunity to look him over. Surely he was a powerful beast, relatively as powerful as the man companions that were his in the stone and ice ages. It is not generally known that the beginnings of the great Metropolitan museum were laid by Pierpont Mor gan and ex-Ambassador Choate, who for 30 years have devoted much time and a great deal of their own money to its welfare. Mr. Morgan’s gifts pass the million mark, I believe. He is always giving something—paint-! lngs, bronzes, relics of one sort or an-1 other. The museum is rapidly near-! ing the point where it will deserve | the name of the greatest in the world. “Joe Jefferson’s Mauve.” HE sale of Anton Mauve’s painting of the flock of sheep for $42,000 has indeed made a sensation in the particular cir cle of those who watch picture prices. It did not astonish al together those who have watched the rise in the value of Mauve’s work, though it is a record, I believe, in this particu lar. These thing3 happen now and then, as they did in the case of Millet, j for example. No amount of theo retical merit or of advertising seems to make them happen when they are expected. Mauve’s work is beautiful. Even those who can’t understand such prices can admit that it is not a “freak” fad that has to be explained. Joseph Jefferson bought this Mauve! for $2,000. Most folks will think $40, 000 a pretty good margin of profit. The actor’s heirs are well pleased. They should be. Joe Jefferson was not merely a shrewd buyer—though luck rather than shrewdness made this magnificent rise—but he was a good painter himself, as everybody knows. He was not so good at a; painting as he was at acting, but he ' was a wonderfully versatile genius, j This is more apparent now with a lit-! tie perspective on his life and work than It could have been in his life time, even to those who had the hap py privilege of standing close to him. His style was not especially ingenious, but it was efficient. Xt may not be fanciful to believe that It had the characteristics of the man’s acting— and his living. It had pleasant quali ties. It was genial painting, I think I may say, and there is no doubt that Joe Jefferson’s brush work will steadi ly rise in value, in the end far beyond any value it can have as work of art. Is New York Lonesome? UST the othei day a man named Gebhardt, a subi urban farmer, who had steadily resisted the ad vance of civiliza tion, decided that he must lose his farm. In fact s new subway sta< tion was likely to come where his onion patch lay Big prices were offered to him and he yielded—he yielded, not to senti ment but to the mere pressure ok money. They offered him $200,000 foi his little house and farm. Mr. and Mrs. Gebhardt were sud denly rich—richer than any of the Gebhardts of the family, richer than they had ever dreamed of being. Are they happy? No. You might risk saying that they are depressed. They have lost their spirit. The old farm is doomed Still Mrs. Gebhardt rakes in the gar den. Still Mr. Gebhardt attends to the few cows and the horse. But neither works with any spirit, for in the fall the old place must be deserted. “Are you going into New York?" they asked Mrs. Gebhardt, who has a married daughter living in Man hatttan. “No,” declared Mrs. Gebhardt, strok ing her apron. “New York’s too lone some.” Lonesome! Is New York too lonesome? Do Its scurrying crowds, its everlasting hus tle, its blind, passionate scramble to "get there” make it a lonesome place for the new comer who has had the comforts of the country? Very likely. Mrs. Gebhardt is not the first philosopher to discover that one may be lonesome in a crowd, that mere numbers of people, mere vol ume of noise, more epileptic agitation does not cure the blues, does not an swer the human craving. Too lonesome! Fancy Mrs. Gebhardt, who has had the companionship of her dog, par rot, cows, horse, the suburban birds and the suburban neighbors, standing in Herald square, or on “the saddest street in the world”—Twenty-third street, as Ida Tarbell called it the other day! Yet Mrs. Gebhardt has $200,000. Wholesale Eviction. HE “improve ments” in New York, which real ly do improve but are never finished, are sometimes hard on the lowly folks. So also are the reform atory movements. For instance, 800 been evicted in obedience, it is said, to an edict of the tenement house commission. Sanitary improvements are to be made, and they need to be made, but the 800 are in deep grief. The scenes in the regions covered by the courts’ action have been pitiful. In many cases the courts themselves interfered to give an extension of time in cases where Immediate eviction would be disastrous. It is the mark of progress over again. Meanwhile little is being done to solve in a satisfactory way the old tenement problem. New-fangled ten ements have been built, hut there are few of them, and the tide of new New Yorkers pour in by every ship. “Where to live?" “That is the problem. It is prophesied that in 50 years only the very rich and the very poor will live on Manhattan Island. The .time between is to see many repetitions of the sad scenes of this week. PASSING OF ST. HELENA. Island to Be Deprived of Garrison and Support by British Government. The British war office has resolved to withdraw the entire garrison from the little island 1,400 miles off the coasi of Guinea where Napoleon died and where, in recent years, the conquered Boer generals had their habitation. At first thought this may seem an insigni ficant matter, but, as it will be present ly pointed out in the house of com mons, it means ruin to the permanent inhabitants of St. Helena. The total estimated value of the island’s wealth is only $1,000,000. di vided among about 10,000 inhabitants. To keep this wealth productive tne garrison, which in normal times amounts to nearly 2,000 men, has been a most active factor. This will at once be seen when it is noted that the im ports, Including specie, are usually five times the value of the exports, and that the expenditure of the island is almost double the revenue. The presence of the garrison means the active annual circulation of over $300,000—Just sufficient to keep up the equilibrium. If this be annihilated the products sold to the ships entered and cleared at St. Helena, while possibly sufficient to keep the population from actual want, must curtail to a measur able degree public expenditures, and hence the civilization of the island, notwithstanding the paltry grant of $2,500 annually from the home govern ment for education, will inevitably suf fer. Street Car Fare*. In 1905, 1,171,151,898 cash fares were collected by the elevated, surface and subway railways of New York city, this number marking an increase of 93,493,651 cash fares over 1904. This means a daily average of over 3,200,000 nickels, Sundays and holidays Includ ed. Reducing these numbers to dollars, the daily contribution to the railway transportation systems of New York city is seen to have been about 9160, 000, and the yearly revenue almost six millions of dollars. INFLUENCE OF GREAT MUSIC It Can Move More Profoundly Than Any of Nature’s Great Voices. Greai music is a psychical storm, agitating to unimaginable depth the mystery of the past within us, says Lafcadio Hearn. Or we might say it. is a produgious incantation, every dif ferent instrument and voice making separate appeal to different billions of prenatal memories. There are tones that call up all the ghosts of youth and joy and tendencies—there are tones that evoke all phantom pain of perished passion—there are tones that resurrect all dead sensations of ma iesty and might and glory—all expired sxultations—all forgotten magnanimi ties. Well, may the influence of music seem inexplicable to the man who idly dreams that his life began less than i hundred years ago! But the mystery lightens for whomsoever learns that the substance of self is older than the sun. He finds that music is a Necro mancy; he feels that to every ripple of melody, to every billow of harmony, there answers within him out of the 3ea of Death and Birth some eddying immeasurable of ancient pleasure and pain. Pleasure and pain: they commingle always in great mu3ic, and therefore '.t is that music can move us more pro foundly than the voice of ocean or than any other voice can do. But in music’s larger utterance, it is ever the sorrow that makes the undertone, the surf mutter of the Sea of Soul. . . Strange to think how vast the »um of joy and woe that must have PROBATION THEN MARRIAGE Surprising Departure in Matrimonial Alliance Instituted in Texas. In Texas, where people do surprising and original things, the institution ol marriage after probation has been in troduced, says the New York Mail The thing was started by a rich far mer, who advertised for a wife, bul specified that the applicant should serve as his housekeeper for a certain length of time in order that he should have a chance to prove her abilitj and temper. It happened that the farmer was satisfied with his first ap plicant and married the lady after a brief period of housekeeping proba tion. It is to be hoped that the pair will live happy ever after. But the real fact is that their “probation" began only after they were married. Mgr riage is an institution for wihch sue cess in mere housekeeping is no test at all. An excellent housekeeper may make a very poor wife and a good employer doe3 not always make a good husband. UNIQUE IDEA IN POCKETS. Man’s Clothing, Even to His Socks, Provided with Receptacles La bled and Indexed. One Detroit man has evolved an idea in pockets, unique and useful, reports the News. He has four inside pockets and eight outside pockets, placed in each waist coat, two inside and eight outside TO PRESIDE OVER RUSSIAN DOUMA. Ivan Petrunkevitch, leader of the Constitutional Democrat party, which faas won a majority of the elections to the Russian douma, will, in all proba bility, be the first president of that body. been experienced before the sense of music could evolve in the brain of man! Don’t Like Autos. Italian peasants are becoming de cidedly hostile to the drivers of auto mobiles. Only a few days ago a rich Roman woman automobilist was shot at by a farmer because she had al most run over his dog. The farmer’s aim was bad, however, and the woman escaped unhurt The occupants of two motor cars returning from Genoa to Alessandra found the road obstructed by telegraph wires stretched tightly across it. In the resulting smash four fingers were cut from the hand of one of the travelers, a young Italian lawyer, and in addition his face was badly slashed and the use of one eye lost Brasseries of Paris. "There was a time,” says Le Petit Parisien, “when the brasseries con stituted the rendezvous of all the art ists, writers and politicians of Paris. This was so during the last years of the second empire and the first years of the third republic. There is now no literary brasserie. Here and there in some cafe the disabled of other times, the "failures,” the waifs of the antique past, try to continue the. tradi tions of art at the brasserie. But it is • bad custom wh<<'h has had its day.” pockets in each pair of trousers, one pocket in each sock, 14 in each coat including outside, inside and shoulder pockets, one on each shirtsleeve anc two in each shirt bosom—a total of 4i pockets. ' Each pocket is labeled, with letter ing in silk thread, thus: “Tobacco," “Pipes,” “Bills." “Ac counts,” “Personal,” “Poems,” “Odds and Ends,” "Miscellaneous,” “Hand kerchiefs,” etc. Each pocket is numbered. The num ber, location and use of the pocket is recorded in a little book hung on his watch chain. When he wants to refer to anything, he looks it up in this di rectory and is able to secure it within an hour. English Women Retrograding. A writer in the Standard of London boldly asserts that the intellectual level of English women has been low ered in the last 50 or 60 years and bases his conclusion on a statement that English women nowadays read only the lighter forms of literature. They read French novels and plays and sensational English fiction gen erally. Their grandmothers, he de clares, used to read Scott’s poems and romances, and they also read history for its own sake. Such girls now would regularly read Freeman, Froude, Carlyle and Stubl i. ‘TRADE AT HOME.” PROBLEM THAT IS BROUGHT HOME TO COMMUNITY. Why Do Mail Order Concerns Thrive When Consumers Are Not Benefited P—The Home Advertisement. The increasing volume of business which is being directed from local dealers to the big mail order houses is threatening the prosperity of thousands of country towns and cities. The busi ness of these big concerns is multiply ing at an alarming rate, and if the ra tio continues the ultimate demoraliza-. tion of business in many rural towns is a foregone conclusion, says Edward K. Slater, food commissioner of Minne sota, in the Retailers’ Journal, Chi cago. Who suffers the greatest financially? It is the business men of the communi ty. Any disinterested person familiar with the ins and outs of the business will concede that the consumer is not profiting at the expense of the home merchant. If this were true the con sumer could not be blamed for taking the best end of the bargain. For the sake of the argument we will assume that the consumer is receiving just as good treatment at the hands of the mail order house as he does from his home merchant. The loss to the mer chant must be somebody’s gain. It follows, therefore, that the mail order house proprietor is the only one who is benefited. bui tne question naturally suggests itself, why does the business of the mail order house increase at such an alarming rate if the consumers are not being benefited? This is one of the greatest arguments advanced by the advocates of the mail order business. The answer is found in the fact that the purchaser responds to advertising and he doesn't like to do business with a country merchant who went to sleep soon after he opened up his business and hasn't waked up yet. That is the situation in a nutshell. The business of the mail order houses has been built up on advertis ing, advertising, advertising! My department has been giving con siderable attention to groceries shipped into the state fcr mail order houses. We have been trying to place before the consumers the fact that many of these goods are illegal under our pure food laws, and that this department has no jurisdiction over such ship ments. We cannot punish such violat ors and thus protect the consumers, as we are enabled to do when the goods are sold inside the state. It follows, as a matter of course, that this depart ment desires to see goods only pur chased through local dealers, so that all consumers will receive the protec tion afforded by a strict enforcement of our pure food laws. The country merchant must do his duty if he desires to compete with the catalogue house. He must beat him with his own weapon—advertising. He, too, must have special prices on certain articles if he wishes to hold the home trade. Grocers and country merchants who think they are so located that they cannot advertise successfully should study the subject of advertising. There is probably no store, city or country, whose business could not be advertised successfully if the propri etor only knew how and has the nerve and patience to do it. There are a few country merchants in remote localities who have mastered advertising so suc cessfully that mail order competition does not bother them. This idea that you have lived so long in a town that everybody knows you and you don’t need to advertise is a mistake. This very indifference to advertising, indif ference to doing business the way busi ness is done in this day and age, is what has enabled the mail order houses to grow from mere nothing ao great concerns. The merchant who can convince the people of his section and keep them convinced that his store is the best place to buy this and that article will not lose trade to the mail order house. Of course, he cannot afford to get out a catalogue as thick as a Bible, but he can keep an advertisement in his local papers and see that it is changed every week, thus keeing new bargains con tinually before the public. He should also have a mai’/ng list and send out a circular letter at least once a month. Nothing is more discouraging than beginning an advertising campaign. Results are almost invariably slow at first. It takes pluck—you must keep at it and master it. Don’t look upon your country news paper as an object of charity. There is not a single country newspaper in your state, with a general local circu lation, which is not able to give full value for money received. The country papers can help you solve this question if you will give them the chance. Quakes and the Panama Canal. The engineers who recommended a sea level isthmian canal did not lay particular stress upon the greater abil ity of that type to withstand an earth quake shock, but this undeniable ad vantake assumes fresh importance in the light of the San Francisco calam ity. One of the strongest arguments against the Nicaragua route was its admitted liability to earthquakes, and while the Panama route is not open to this objection it cannot be safely predicted that it will not be visited by shocks severe enough to damage a sea level canal and to wreck one with locks.—Cleveland Plain Dealer. — “Tar” for Sailor. Why is the word “tar” a synonym for “sailor?” Some dictonaries say 1 that the allusion is to the seaman’s tarry hands and clothes—the "savor of tar” of Stephano’s song in “The Tem pest," Burns uses “tarrybreeks" as equivalent to “sailor.” But it is re garded as much more probable that ] “tar'’ is short for "tarpaulin,” since Clarendon and other writers col- I loquilly use “tarpaulin” to signify a 1 seaman. Of course, this ultimately 1 gets back to tar, a tarpaulin being a 1 tarred “palling,” or covering (the 1 same word as “pall”). Modern Definition. Professor—Suppose an irresistible i force should meet an Immovable body, what would be the result? 1 Student—A merger.—Judge. i ASTONISHING LAND VALUES _ United States and Canada Rich in Examples of Rapid Rise in Prices. To those who are skeptical of the wisdom of investing money in real es tate there are numerous instances of cities where every inch of land is of great value which have been built upon sites formerly sold for little or even given away. The United States and Canada are rich in such examples. Canada especially has been the scene of great bargains in land. During the first years of its history James I. made a free gift of the whole of Canada, to gether with Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, to the famous Lord Stirling. Some 200 years later a member of the suite of the governor of the colony was granted 100,000 acres of land by William IV. Later this was increased by the addition of 500,000 acres. Sixty years later a Canadian land company was given 3,000,000 acres, 2,000,000 be ing paid for at the rate of 60 cents aa acre, and the rest a free gift. As late as 1880 the Canadian government ac tually made the Scotch-Canadian com pany a present of $2,500,000 in cash, as a bonus, with a free grant of 25,000,000 acres. As there were many conditions as to the development of the territory in the terms of ilie grant, the bargain was not so one-sided as it at first ap pears. Everyone knows that the whole of Manhattan island was sold by the In dians for $24. Yet a plot of ground which was once a tarm, and was grant ed and still belongs to Trinity church, yields a yearly income of $10,000,000. Pennsylvania, the second most popu lous state in America, containing scores of prosperous cities, has an area of about 45.000 square miles. This tract of land was given over to Wil liam Pinn in settlement of a compara tively trifling debt which Charles II. owed to Penn’s father, and which he found himself disinclined or unable to pay in cash. The same improvident king was the one who rented 2,700,000 square miles of the land about Hudson Bay for a yearly rental of two beavers and two elk per annum. This has proved to be one of the best speculations in land on record. Some 200 years after the deal the company of owners sold the major part of this vast territory to the Cana dian Federation for $2,500,000, and in the meantime it had been bringing in an average income of $500,000 a year. Not more than 270 years ago the present site of Liverpool was sold for $2,250 by a small London syndicate, who had bought it from Charles I. for less. The site of Johannesburg and most of its gold mines, which are said to contain over $14,000,000,000 worth of the precious metal, were sold less than 30 years ago to an Englishman named Pratt for the sum of $1,500. In spite of its cheapness it was a bad bargain for him, for because of his activity in the first Boer war his property was confis cated and he was driven to England in a penniless state. FORECASTING BIG FLOODS. Most Destructive Inundation for Fifty Years Accurately Foretold by Weather Bureau. Early in 1897 telegrams were posted in a hundred cities along the Missis sippi, warning the inhabitants to pre pare for tremendous floods. These warnings, says J. E. Watkins, in the Technical World, went so far as to name the exact date—sometimes two or three weeks off—when the coming flood would be at its height, and even stated the number of feet above low water mark the water would reach. They were signed by the chief of the weather bureau at Washington. The inhabitants of Cairo, New Or leans and of the towns and cities be tween read these sensational messages, looked out at the shrunken Father of Waters flowing calmly along within its banks and sniffed contemptuously. They were not going to be scared by a lot of fool scientists in Washington! Only a comparatively few timid people were at all alarmed or even impressed. These went so far as to move their valuable property up onto high ground, and were well laughed at for their pains. Even the newspapers took the matter up, and scolded the govern ment for allowing the weather bu reau to frighten neerlessly a lot of ailly old women. Finally the date set for the coming of the flood arrived, and with it came the water. The greatest flood for more than half a century swept down the Mississippi and overflowed more than 13,000 square miles of land. The main Btreets of a hundred towns and cities were under water; and, at some points practically the only property not drm aged was that of the ridiculed people who had heeded the despised warning of the weather bureau. And it was es timated that property to the value of $15,000,000 was saved, which would certainly have been destroyed but for the advance notice which its owners lad been wise enough to heed. Chauffeurs of Long Ago. There were chauffeurs long before automobiles. History tells us that ibout the year 1795 men strangely ac ;outered, their faces covered with mot and their eyes carefully disguised, intered by nights farms and lonely labitations and committed all sorts >f depredations. They garroted their victims, dragged them before a great ire, wlrere they burned the soles of heir feet and demanded information is to the whereabouts of their money ind jewels. Hence they were called ‘chauffeurs,” a name which frightened 10 much our good grandmothers. Jail-Breaker’s Offense. The charge against a man named Armstrong, who had made his escape vhile being taken to jail, the other lay, was: “That Armstrong got at arge whithersoever he would, to the ;reat hindrance of justice and the evil sxample of all others in the like case iffending, and against the peace of iur sovereign lord the king, his crown md dignity.” Thoroughly Professional. “Did you say that she is a profes lional nurse?” “I think so. Anyway, she’s going o marry him just as soon as he can lit up."—Milwaukee Sentinel. NOTES ON THE FASHIONS: Linen Parasols (Jo with Plainer Shirt Waist Suits and Lingerie Styles Harmonize. The most fascinating hats and para sols have come out, seemingly planned and made to go together, yet in reali ty happening upon that effect in nine cases out of ten. Lingerie styles are responsible for much of it—the whole wide range of 'ingerie ideas echoed and reechoed in ;he parasols; in fainter, though no less exquisite, tone in hats. Some one has glibly prophesied the passing of the fluffy parasol, claiming that in stead will be carried the plainer types: Yet lingerie dresses grow more pop ular all the while, and ruffles are piled upon ruffles, ^emingly without =nd. That prophecy is bound to be wrong, for, so long as the summer girl holds court dressed in the sheer ast, softest of gowns, which billows and froths about her, just so long will she, in spite of fashion’s dictums, twirl, in lieu of a scepter, the airiest, most useless, but wonderfully pictur esque and becoming parasol. Those plainer styles will be car ried more than the fluffy ones without a doubt—just as shirt-waist suits and the many attractive models of linen suits are more in evidence in sun times than those billowy, beruffled beribboned things. But each will have its place and each will be car ried—you might almost say worn— with the sort of gown it best suits. And hats of linen and of linen and lace will go with them. For the plainest shirt-waist suits the prettiest linen parasol is made, plain except for a rather large motif embroidered in each panel, or per haps in only one, with the initials cunningly interwoven, so as not to be too conspicuously plain to any one—more in the nature of those clever seals which look like an old eastern charm, but which are real ly the three initials made into a cabalistic sign. Eyelet work holds Its own in the parasol world, and insertions of lace are even more popular than ever, both cluny and Irish lace used in lavish profusion.—Chicago Record Herald. IRONING-BOARD CASE. Pine to Take Away on a Summer Va cation. Makes You Independent of Expensive Laundress. One of the most acceptable pres ents to make for your friend’s summer trip is the case for a very small iron ing board, with the little board in side. Get a smooth board about 14 inches long by five inches wide, and cover it with a thick soft flannel, plac ing over this a piece of fine muslin. Sew it on securely and smoothly. Then cut your cover a little larger than the board, and in the form of a long envelope, with the opening and flap at one end. Bind it with rib bon or galloon, and make a button hole in the flap, with a button to cor respond on the cover. Put, also, on the cover a pocket, large enough to hold a small ironhoider, made of ticking, lined with thick flannel, and covered with the same material as the cover, which should be of a bright, flowered cretonne. Small charcoal irons can be bought that are easily carried and heated. Wltn this outfit your friends will be independent of laundresses, as far as collars, cuffs and small articles are concerned.— Chicago Inter Ocean. WHEN HANGING PICTURES. Study suitability of subjects when assigning pictures to their position, as a picture that is suitable in one room may be entirely out of keeping with the general character and pur pose of another. Do not crowd pictures. Too few aie preferable to too many, and plain spaces are restful in their effect. Oil paintings, water colors, and line drawings show the artist’s work and what he meant to depict much bettei when hung flat against the wall—not tilted. Never hang a glossy picture opposite a. window, and never hang any picture so high that it is hard to look at. Do not hang pictures in pairs, and do not hang two from one hook if the wire on both shows—the oblique lines made by the two wires are very ob jectionable. A picture which shows heavy shad 3ws should be hung with the shadows^ away from the window, to make the shadows seem natural ones. Pictures are less apt to get skewed when dusting, or by other means, if lung on two hooks instead of one. The lines of the wire are less objectionable, too, as they are horizontal and per pendicular, as are the lines of the* frame. When the wires can be entire ly behind the picture, out of sight, the lest effect is secured.—Prairie Farmer. Soft Gingerbread. Break a fresh egg in a bowl, stir with a fork, add a tablespoonful of melted butter and All the bowl half rull of sour cream. Fill to the top with New Orleans molasses, turn Into > larger bowl, beat and add a cupful of lour into which has been sifted a level :easpoonful of soda. Add a teaspoon mi each of ginger, allspice and cinna mon, and a little salt Bake in a sheet. A LITTLE STJTFEBEB. And what is your lfttio v sailed?” lttle brother Oh, he suffers wid de Mortimer Percival Roland!” °*