Loup City Northwestern
J. W. BURLEIGH, Publish*!*.
WOUP CTTT, ... NEBRASKA.
gj* . • -»■' 1 ' w i
Agricultural Exports.
The calendar year is closing with
every indication that the remarkable
volume of exports will remain at the
flood. A bulletin from the bureau of
statistics at Washington is testimony
to this effect. The bulletin deals with
the exports of domestic breadstuffs,
meat and dairy products, food animals,
cotton and mineral oils for November
and for the 11 months of the present
year ended with November. The total
of these exports for November was
$105,311,000 against $99,341,000 in 1905,
•nd for the 11 months $788,257,000
compared with $703,569,000 last year.
The December returns are not likely
to show any relative decrease, and the
entire year is fairly certain to show a
large advance over last. Several
features of the bulletin showing com
mand special interest. Though there
•was something of a falling off in this
class of exports for the month, our
shipments abroad of meat and dairy
products and of food cattle were $208,
$79,000 in 1906, or more than $20,000,
X>00 in excess of these of the same 11
months of 1905. Legislation by con
gress and the steps taken by the ad
ministration in accordance therewith,
aiming at safeguarding the purity of
the output, have increased foreign con
fidence. The figures are of value as
proving that while we sell abroad less
barley, oats and corn, we are disposing
in large quantity of what may be
called the finished products from such
caw material. The Alnericans are
feeding more of the grain to live stock
and selling more cattle and meat to
the old world. This is really an
economic advantage, as finding a mar
ket for the higher valued product al
ways is. The bulletin accentuates the
predominance of this country as a
source of food supply, while the com
plete returns are pretty certain tc
prove that it has been a big year for
exports of manufactures also.
Poland’s Pitiable Condition.
The situation of Poland to-day is
pitiable. Business in Warsaw has
fallen off 50 per cent, and more; the
fashionable boulevards are partly de:
aerted; the restaurants are but halt
filled, and the leading hotel is running
at a loss. The city swarms with
troops, but martial law brings only
oppression, not security. Hardly a
day passes but officials are killed ot
wounded by the terrorists, while sus
pected persons are arrested, clubbed
or shot to death by the authorities
The terrorists are strong enough tc
defy the government, while the gov
ernment is strong enough to crush a
general revolt, and the result is an
archy. When it will end no one can
tell. But some day, says G. H. Blakes
lee in the Outlook, peace will surely
come, for Poland is to have autonomy
The Poles demand it. The great ma
jority of the Russian Duma has prom
Ised it, and Russian liberalism must
eventually win.
Romance of Motor Travel.
The motor car has rescued the ro
mance of travel, freeing it from the ir
ritating compulsions and contacts of
the railway, the bondage to fixed
feours and the beaten track and ap
proach to each town through the area
of ugliness and desolation created by
the railway itself. With the motor,
says Edith Wharton, in Atlantic, we
•lave regained the wonder, the ad
venture and the novelty which en
livened the way of our posting grand
parents; above all, the delight of tak
ing a town unawares, stealing on it
by back ways and unchronicled paths,
surprising in it some intimate aspect
;of past time, some silhouette hidden
■for half a century or more by the ugly
mask of railway embankments and the
glass and iron bulk of a huge station.
Then the villages that one missed and
yearned for from the windows of the
train—the villages have been given
back to us.
Mexico winds up its year with a re
markably satisfactory financial show
ing. She reports exports of $271,000,
000, an increase of nearly $63,000,000
over the preceding year, and imports
of $220,651,000, a gain of over $42,000,
000. But what is still better is the ad
vance along all the lines of domestic
development. Mexico is literally liv
ing in peace and plenty, with the most
efficient of governments under the
wise directing hand of President Diaz.
The day of upheavals and factional
disorders, resulting in general demor
alization, seems to be past forever
Mexico has learned the secret of wise
self-government.
London newspapers are paying
splendid compliments to the kind ol
ambassadors America has sent to the
mother country when they demand
that the government send to Wash
ington a man like James Russell Low
/ ell, Joseph H. Choate or Whitelaw
Reid to represent British interests
They seem to think the need of the
times is an ambassador from the Brit
ish to the American nation rather thar
an envoy of the British governmeni
to do business with the Americar
state department
Stamford, Conn., ministers have en
tered Into an agreement to refuse ir
future “to marry persons both o!
whom are strangers.” Out here it has
always been the custom among
preachers and others possossing the
right to perform the marriage cere
mony to insist that the “contracting
parties” must at least have been intro
duced to each other before the begin
ding of the sacred rites.
The bell in the Kremlin at Moscow
weighs 432,000 pounds. It is th«
-world's biggest.
THE DELUGE
By DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS, Author of “THECQSZ&c
(CCfy&GffT /SOS by 3QBBS-/ZS3BIZ/. CQrt&i/Sy/
CHAPTER XVI.—Continued.
“I owe a lot to you. Matt,” he plead
ed. “But I’ve done you a great many
favors, haven’t I?”
“That you have, Bob,” I cordially
agreed. “But this isn’t a favor. It's
business.”
"You mustn't ask it, Blacklock,” he
cried. “I’ve loaned you more money
now than the law allows. And I can’t
let you have any more.”
“Some one has been lying to you,
and you’ve been believing him,” said
I. “When I say my request isn’t a
favor, but business I mean it.”
“I can’t let you have any more,” he
repeated. "I can’t!” And down came
his fist in a weak-violent gesture.
I leaned forward and laid my hand
strongly on his arm.
“In addition to the stock of this con
cern that I hold in my own name,”
said I, “I hold five shares in the name
of a man whom nobody knows that I
even know. If you don’t let me have
the money, that man goes to the dis
trict attorney with information that
lands you in the penitentiary, that
puts your company out of business
and into bankruptcy before to-morrow
noon. I saved you three years ago,
and got you this job against just such
an emergency as this, Bob Corey,
And, by God, you’ll toe the mark!”
“But we haven’t done anything that
every bank in town doesn’t do every
day—doesn't have to do. If we didn’t
lend money to dummy borrowers and
over-c.ertify accounts, our customers
would go where they could get accom
modations.”
| "That s true enough, saia 1. "Hut
I'm In a position for the moment
where I need my friends—and they’ve
got to come to me. If I don't get the
money from you. I’ll get it elsewhere
—but over the cliff with you and your
bank! The laws you’ve been violat
ing may be bad for the practical bank
ing business, but the're mighty good
for punishing ingratitude and treach
ery.”
He sat there, yellow and pinched,
and shivered every now and then. He
made no reply.
Presently I shook his arm impatient
ly. His eyes met mine, and 1 fixed
them.
"I'm going to pull through,” said I.
‘‘But if I weren’t, I'd see to it that you
were protected. Come, what’s your
answer? Friend or traitor?”
“Can’t you give me any security—
any collateral?”
“No more than I took from you
when I saved you as you were going
down with the rest in the Dumont
smash. My word—that's all. I bor
row on the same terms you’ve given
me before, the same you’re giving four
of your heaviest borrowers right now.”
He winced as I thus reminded him
how minute my knowledge was of the
workings of his bank.
"I didn’t think this of you, Matt,”
he whined. “I believed you above
such hold-up methods.”
“I suit my methods to the men I’m
dealing with,” was tr y answer. "These
fellows are trying to push me off the
life raft. I fight with every weapon 1
can lay hands on. And 1 know as well
as you do that, if you get into serious
trouble through this loan, at least five
men we could both name would have
to step in and save the bank and cover
up the scandal. You'll blackmail
them, just as you've blackmailed them
before, and they you. Blackmail’s a
legitimate part of the game. Nobody
■ appreciates that better than you.” It
was no time for the smug hypocrisies
under which we people down town
usually conduct our business—just
as the desperadoes used to patrol the
highways disguised as peaceful mer
chants.
“Send round in the morning and get
the money,” said he, putting on a re
signed, hopeless look.
I laughed. “I’ll feel easier if I take
it now,” I replied. “We’ll fix up the
notes and checks at once.”
He reddened, but after a brief hesi
tation busied himself. When the
papers were all made up and signed,
and I had the certified checks in my
pocket, I said: “Wait here, Bob, un
til the National Industrial people call
you up. I’ll ask them to do it, so they
can get your personal assurance that
everything's all right. And I'll stop
there until they tell me they’ve talked
with you.”
“But its too late, he said. “You
can't deposit to-day.”
“I’ve made special arrangements
with them,” I replied.
His face betrayed him. I saw that
at no stage of that proceeding had I
been wiser than in shutting off his
last chance to evade. What scheme
he had in mind I don t> know, and can’t
imagine. But he had thought out
something, probably something fool
ish that would have given me trouble
without saving him. A foolish man
in a tight place is as foolish as ever,
and Corey was a foolish man—only a
fool commits crimes that put him m
the power of others. The crimes of
the really big captains of industry and
generals of finance are of the kind
that puts others in their [lower.
“Buck up, Corey,” said I. "Do you
think I’m the man to shut a friend in
the hold of a sinking ship? Tell me,
who told you I was short on textile?”
“One of my men,” he slowly replied,
as he braced himself together.
“Which one? Who?” I persisted.
For I wanted to know Just how far
the news was likely to spread.
He seemed to be thinking out a lie.
“The truth!” I commanded. ”1
know it couldn’t have been one of
your men. Who was it? I’ll not give
you liyay.”
“It Was Tom Langdon,” he finally
■aid.
I checked an exclamation of amuse
ment. I hk&^becn assuming that I
had been betrayed by some one of
those tiny mischances that so often
throw the be3t plans into confusion.
“Tom Langdon,” I said satirically.
“It was he that warned you against
me?”
“It was a friendly act,” said Corey.
“He and I are very intimate. And he
doesn't know how close you and 1
are.”
“Suggested that you call my loans,
did he?” I went on.
“You mustn't blame him, Blacklock;
really you mustn’t,” said Corey ear
nestly, for he was a pretty good friend
to those he liked, as friendship goes
in finance. "He happened to hear.
You know the Langdons keep a sharp
watch on operations in their stock.
And he dropped in to warn me as a
friend. You'd do the same thing In
the same circumstances. He didn't
say a word about my calling your
loans. I—to be frank—I instantly
thought of it myself. I intended to do
it when you came, but”—a sickly
smile—“you anticipated me.”
“I understand.” said I good-hu
moredly. “I don't blame him.” And 1
didn't then.
After I had completed my business
at the National Industrial, I went back
to my office and gathered together the
threads of my web of defense. Then
I wrote and sent out to all my news
papers and all my agents a broadside
against the management of the textile
trust—it would be published in the
morning, in good time for the opening
of the stock exchange. Before the
first quotation of textile could be mads
thousands on thousands of investors
“I TOOK IT AS THOUGH I WERE AFRAID THE SPELL WOULD BE
DDA ITPXT »»
and speculators throughout the coun
try would have read my letter, would
be believing that Matthew Blacklock
had detected the textile trust in a
stock-jobbing swindle, and had
promptly turned against it, preferring
to keep faith with his customers and
with the public. As I read over my
pronunciamiento aloud before sending
it out, I found in it a note of confi
dence that cheered me mightily. “I’m
even stronger than I thought," said
I. And I felt stronger still as I went
on to picture the thousands on thou
sands throughout the land rallying at
my call to give battle.
XVII.
ANITA BEGINS TO BE HERSELF.
I had asked Sam Ellersly to dine
with me; so preoccupied was I that
not until ten minutes before the hour
set did he come into my mind—he or
any of his family, even his sister. My
first impulse was to send word that
I couldn’t keep the engagement. “But
I must dine somewhere,” I reflected,
"and there’s no reason why I shouldn't
dine with him, since I’ve done every
thing that can be done.” In my office
suite I had a bath and dressing-room,
with a complete wardrobe. Thus, by
hurrying a little over my toilet, and by
making my chauffeur crowd the speed
limit, I was at Delmonico’s only
twenty minutes late.
Sam, who had been late also, as
usual, was having a cocktail and was
ordering the dinner. I smoked a cig
arette and watched him. At business
or at anything serious his mind was
all but useless; but at ordering dinner
and things of that sort, he shone.
Those small accomplishments of his
had often moved me to a sort of
pitying contempt, as if one saw a man
of talent devoting himself to engrav
ing the Lord’s Prayer on gold dollars.
That evening, however, as I saw how
comfortable and contented he looked,
with not a cars in the world, since he
was to have a good dinner and a good
cigar afterward; as I saw how much
genuine pleasure he was getting out
i ing chiefly of—of club matters,” he
answered, in a fair imitation of his
usual offhand manner.
“When does my name come up
there?” I said.
He flushed and shifted. “I was just
about to tell you," he stammered. "But
perhaps you know?”
“Know what?”
“That—Hasn't Tom told you? He
has withdrawn—and—you’ll have to
get another second—if you think—
that is—unless you—I suppose you’d
have told me, if you'd changed your
mind?” •
Since I had become so deeply inter
ested in Anita, my ambition—ambi
tion!—to join the Travelers had all
but dropped out of my mind.
“I had forgotten about it,” said I.
"But, now that you remind me, 1
want my name withdrawn. It was a
passing fancy. It was part and parcel
of a lot of damn foolishness I’ve been
indulging in for the last few months.
But I’ve come to my senses—and it’s
‘me to the wild,’ where I belong, Sam
my, from this time on.”
He looked tremendously relieved,
and a little puzzled, too. I thought I
was reading him like an illuminated
sign. “He’s eager to keep friends
with me,” thought I, "until he’s abso
lutely sure there’s nothing more in it
for him and his people.” And that
guess was a pretty good one. It is not
to the discredit of my shrewdness
that I didn’t see it was not hope, but
fear, that made him try to placate me.
then what the Langdons haa done. But
Sammy was saying, in bis friendli
est tone:
“What’s the matter, old man?
You’re sour to-night.”
"Never in a better humor,” 1 as
sured him, and as I spoke the words
they came true. What I had been say
ing about the Travelers and all it rep
resented—all the snobbery, and smirk
ing, and rotten pretense—my final and
absolute renunciation of it all—acted
on me as I’ve seen religion act on
the fellows that used to go up to the
mourners’ bench at the revivals. 1
--
i
of selecting the dishes and giving the
waiter minute directions for the chef,
I envied him.
“You must come over to my rooms
after dinner, and give me some
music,” I said.
“Thanks,” he replied, “but I've
promised to go home and play bridge.
Mother's got a few in to dinner, and
more are coming afterward, 1 believe.”
“Then I’ll go with you, and talk to
your sister—she doesn’t play.”
He glanced at me in. a way that
made me pass my hand over my face.
I learned at least part of the reason
for my feeling at disadvantage before
him. I had forgotten to shave, and
as my beard is heavy and black it has
to be looked after twice a day. “Oh,
I can stop at my rooms and get my
face into condition in a few minutes,”
said I.
"And put on evening dress, too,” he
suggested. “You wouldn’t want to go
in a dinner jacket.”
I can’t say why this was the “last
straw,” but it was.
“Bother!” said I, my common sense
smashing the spell of snobbishness
that had begun to reassert itself as
soon as I got into his unnatural, un
healthy atmosphere. “I’ll go as I am,
beard and all. I only make myself
ridiculous, trying to be a sheep. I’m
a goat, and a goat I’ll stay.”
That shut him Into himself. When
he remerged, it was to say: "Some
thing doing down town to-day, eh?"
A sharpness in his voice and in his
eyes, too, made me put my mind on
him more closely, and then I saw what
I should have seen before—that he
was moody and slightly distant.
“Seen Tom Langdon this after
noon?” I asked carelessly.
He colored. “Yes—had lunch with
him,” was his answer.
I smiled—for his benefit. “Aha!"
thought I. “So Tom Langdon has
been fool enough to take this paroquet
into his confidence.” Then I said to
him: “Is Tom making the rounds,
warning the rats to leave the sinking
ship?”
“What do you mean. Matt?” he de
manded, as if I had accused him.
I looked steadily at him, and I imag
ine my unshaven jaw did not make
my aspect alluring.
“What did Tom say about me?” I
inquired.
“Oh, almost nothing. We were talk
.//,/ 'THTJmWL nr i
felt as if I had suddenly emerged from
the parlor of a dive and its stench of
sickening perfumes, into the pure air
of God’s heaven.
I signed the bill, and we went afoot
up the avenue. Sam, as I saw with a
good deal of amusement, was trying
to devise some subtle, tactful way of
attaching his poor, clumsy little suc
tion-pump to the well of my secret
thoughts.
"What is it Sammy?” said I at last.
“What do you want to know that
you’re afraid to ask me?”
“Nothing,” he said hastily. “I’m
only a bit worried about—about you
and textile. Matt,”—this in the tone
of deep emotion we reserve for the
attempt to lure friends into confiding
that about themselves which will give
us the opportunity to pity them, and,
if necessary, to sheer off from them—
“Matt, I do hope you haven’t been
hard hit?”
“Not yet,” said I easily. “Dry your
tears and put away your black clothes.
Your friend, Tom Langdon, was a lit
tle premature.”
“I’m afraid I’ve given you a false
impression,” Sam continued, with an
overeagerness to convince me that did
not attract my attention at the time.
“Tom merely said, ‘I hear Blacklock
is loaded up with textile shorts,’—
that was all. A careless remark. I
really didn’t think of it again until 1
saw you looking so black and glum.”
That seemed natural enough, so I 1
changed the subject. As we entered
his house, I said:
“I'll not go up to the drawing-room.
Make my excuses to your mother,
will you? I’ll turn into the little
smoking-room here. Tell your sister—
and say I’m going to stop only a mo
ment."
Sam had just left me when the but
ler came. “Mr. Ball—I think that was
the name, sir—wishes to speak to you
on the telephone.”
I had gjven Ellersly’s as one of the
places at which I might be found,
should it be necessary to consult me.
I followed the butler to the telephone
closet under the main stairway. As
soon as Ball made sure it was I, he
oegan.
"I’ll use the code words. I’ve just
seen Fearless, as you told me to.”
Fearless—that was Mitchell, my spy
in the employ of Tavistock, who was
my principal rival in the business of
confidential brokerage for the high
financiers. “Yes,” said I. "What does
he say?”
"There has been a great deal of
heavy buying for a month past.”
Then my dread was well founded—
textiles were to be deliberately rock
eted. "Who's been doing it?” I asked.
"He found out only this afternoon.
It’s been kept unusually dark. It—”
“Who? Who?” I demanded.
"Intrepid,” he answered.
Intrepid—that is, Langdon—Mow
bray Langdon!
“The whole thing was planned care
fully,” continued Ball, “and is coming
off according to schedule. Fearless
overheard a final message Intrepid’S
brother brought from him to-day."
So \( was no mischance—it was an !
assassination. Mowbray Langdon had
stabbed me in the back and fled.
“Did you hear what I said?” asked
Ball. "Is that you.”
“Yes,” I replied.
"Oh.” came in a relieved tone from
the other end of the wire. “You were
so long in answering that I thought
I’d been cut off. Any instructions?”
"No,” said I. “Good-by.”
I heard him ring off, but I sat there
for several minutes, the receiver still
to my ear. I vas muttering: “Lang- '
don, Langdon — why — why—why?” j
again and again. Why had he turned
against me? Why had he plotted to
destroy me—one of those plots so fre
quent in Wall street—where the assas
sin steals up, delivers the mortal blow,
and steals away without ever being
detected or even suspected? I saw
the whole plot now—I understood Tom
Langdon's activities, I recalled Mow
bray Langdon's curious phrases and
looks and tones. But—why—why—
why? How was I in his way?
It was all dark to me—pitch-dark.
I returned to the smoking-room, light
ed a cigar, sat fumbling at the new
situation. I was in no worse plight
than before—what did it matter wno
was attacking me? In the circum
stances, a novice could now destroy
me as easily as a Langdon. Still,
Ball’s news seemed to take away my
courage. I reminded myself that 1
was used to treachery of this sort
that I deserved what I was getting be
cause I had, like a fool, dropped my
guard in the fight that is always on
every-man-for-hlmself. But I remind
ed myself in vain. Langdon’s smiling
treachery made me heart-sick.
Soon Anita appeared—preceded and
heralded by a faint rustling from soft
and clinging skirts, that swept my
nerves like a love-tune.
I think my torment must have some
how penetrated to her. For she was
sweet and friendly—and she could not
have hurt me worse! If I had fol
lowed my impulse I should have fallen
at her feet and buried my face, scorch
ing, in the folds of that pale blue,
faintly-shimmering robe of hers.
“Do throw away that huge, hideous
cigar,” she said, laughing. And she
took two cigarettes from the box, put
both between her lips, lit them, held
one toward me. I looked at her face,
and along her smooth, bare, out
stretched arm, and at the pink, slen
der fingers holding the cigarette. 1
took it as if I were afraid the spell
would be broken, should my fingers
touch hers. Afraid—that’s it! That’s
why I didn’t pour out all that was in
my heart. I deserved to lose her.
“I’m taking you away from th«
others,” I said. We could hear the
murmur of many voices and of music
" (To be Continued.)
All-Embracln^.
The Allahabad Pioneer quotes aa
East Indian doctor's death certificate:
“I am of mind that he died for want of
foodings, or on account of starvation.
Maybe also for other things of hia
comfortables, and most probably ha
died of drowning.” Tt is a careful,
omnibus opinion, and reads like a
weather prediction that cannot mist
and runs the whole gamut cf meteoric
logical possibilities.—N. Y. Tribune.
Her Advice.
Miss Anteek*—If you were me would
you marry a man who proposed to you
by telegraph?
Miss Pert—Yes, and I’d catch the
next train in order to meet him half
way.—Chicago Record-Herald.
HIS EYES OPEN
W hy There Are No Mail
Order Catalogues in
One Home.
FARMER WILLIAMS’ LESSON
In Time of Adversity He Got to Un
derstand Who Were His Real
Friends—Prosperity in Stand
ing Together.
(Copyright, 1906, by Alfred C. Clark.)
“What y’ got there. Sis?” inquired
Farmer Williams, as he kicked off his
felt boots and set them carefully be
hind the stove to dry. “That’s what
I thought it looked like, one of them
there Chicago catylogs, though I hain’t
seen one dost fer quite a few years
back. Me an' your ma ust to buy
mighty nigh everthing we used out
of them catylogs when we first come
to Kansas. Land sakes, I have to
laugh now sometimes when I think of
the way we would git ketched onct in
awhile. They’s some cheap things in
them catylogs, an’ then agin they's a
lot ’t ain’t so cheap. Y' never kin
tell till they come, an’ then it’s too
late to send ’em back. But as I was
a sayin’, we hain’t bought nothin’ out
of a catylog fer a right smart o’ years
now, an’ the way it come about I had
as well tell y’, cause I don’t think
y’ really remember much about it.
“When we come to Kansas long in
the first of the ’80’s we got along right
well. We was able to pay cash fer
what we got, and we got the money
fer everything we sold. We was pay
in’ out on the place right along; crops
was pqrty good an’ we was a feelin’
like the Lord was a smilin’ on our
efforts, and the happy home we
dreamed about when we first got mar
ried was in sight.
But they come a change in Kansas
long in the last half of the ’80’s.
Times got hard and kep a gittin’
tighter. Four straight years it was
so dry y’ had to soak the hogs afore
they’d hold swill—though I will say
they was some extry reason on ac
count of the swill bein’ so thin—wheat
jest died in the ground fer want of
rain, and the hot winds biled the ever
lastin’ sap out of the corn. They
wasn’t no pasture, no nothing. You
can know we was a feelin’ purty blue
about that time, but we was young
and strong, and thought with the
chickens an’ hogs we could git through
anyway.
i iicu uur uaj juu gui lu cuiupmm
in’ and lookin’ so thin it worried us.
Your ma is a middlin’ good doctor,
take it all around, but nothing she
could think of done you any good.
Well, you kep’ a gittin’ pindlier and
pindlier, till you got so'st y’ wouldn’t
do nothin’ but set in a chair by the
kitchen stove, wrapped in your ma’s
old shawl, an’ you looked so pitiful
that we made up our minds to have
the doctor, even if it took th’ last
chicken on the place. Well, he come,
and after he’d looked at you awhile
an’ felt your pulse, he shet his watch
up with a snap, an’ says, quiet like:
‘Better fix up a warm place fer her
in the front room, don’t have too much
light nor any drafts to strike her.’
Then wre knowed it wan't no small
sickness-we had to fight, an’ when we
got you fixed up in bed I follered Doc.
out on the porch an' I says: ‘Well,
Doc.,’ sez I, ‘what’s the matter with
our little girl?’
“ ‘I don’t want to skeer ye, Mr. Wil
liams,’ says he, ‘but I’m afraid she's
in for a siege of typhoid fever.’
“Well, after he was gone I went out
in the kitchen an’ told your ma, but
she says, brave as kin be: ‘Well, Ezra,
if the Lord has seen fit to put that
much more on our load we must bear
up an’ fight it out doin’ our duty the
best we kin, leavin’ the rest to him.’
An’ l thought so too. So we jest kep’
our hearts brave an' done what
seemed right t’ do.
“The hardest thing was to figure out
where t’ git the medicine, an’ fruit,
an’ dainty things your sickness called
■ ■I »
“Why Cert'nlee, Mr. Williams, Jest
Let Us Know What You Want.”
for. We hadn’t been tradin’ much
with the stores in Huston, buyin’
mostly from the catylog folks y’ know,
an’ so we didn’t have any credit there
to speak of. But I went t’ Foster, th’
druggist, an’ I told him how things
was. I didn’t have no money t' pay i
fer th’ medicine an’ things, an’ the
prospects fer the next year was as
poor er poorer than th’ last.
“ ‘Why cert’nlee, Mr. Williams,’ he
says, ‘jest let us know what you want
an’ we’ll carry you along till times
come better fer you. We’re all in a i
tight pinch now, but if we hang t’geth
er things is all goin’ to come out right
In the end. I have faith in th’ coun
try, an’ in the people that live here,
an’ nobody’s sick baby is a goin’ to
suffer if I kin help any.’
“Well, it was the same thing at
Harlow’s grocery, an’ th’ coal yard,
everywhere in th’ town. ‘Cert’nlee,
Mr. Williams, we’ll see y’ through on
this.’ It made me feel mean an’ small
some way, though I don’t know why.
An’ often when they’d put in a few
oranges or somethin’ like that, sayin
in a ’pologizin’ sort of way, ‘little
somethin’ fer th* sick baby, Williams,’
why somehow it made a hard lump
come up in my throat, an’ I had a
queer feelin’ in my eyes, kinder achy
Uke. y’ know.
‘"Well, to be short about it, fer eight]
weeks you kep’ a gittin’ weaker an’
weaker, an’ we kep’ a feelin’ more ’n’
more hopeless. It was a sad Christ
mas in our home that year. Your ma
was jest wore out with watchin’ an
tryin’ to do her work between times,
an’ I was so nigh sick with trouble an'
discouragement ’t I ust to go around
by the barn an’ jest cry like a baby.
But I never let on to your ma though,
ner she t’ me. We tried t’ encourage
each other though we knowed in our
hearts ’t all our cheerful words was
lies, an’ each one knowed the other
knowed it too.
“Well, jest th’ night before New
Years Doc. called us outside your
room. Oh, how my heart sunk then!
‘I don’t want to hold out any false
hopes to you people,’ he says, ‘but I
think with proper care from now oe,
your little girl is goin’t’ git well.’
Elsie, it seemed jest like a ton of
hay had been lifted off my chest right
there. As fer your ma, why she jest
busted down an’ cried as hard as she
could. After Doc. was gone we went
out to the kitchen an’ kneeled down
right there an’ thanked God fer the
most glorious New Year's gift he ever
give t’ anybody in th’ world—the
health of our baby girl. You know
your pa ain’t no ranter er shouter.
yer ma bein’ a Baptist has furnished
I sez: Les Burn it.
most of th’ r’ligion fer our house, but
jest then I seen how it was that they
comes times in people’s lives when
they've jest got to have somethin'
bigger an’ greater than anything hu
man t’ turn to with a great joy er a
great sorrer.
“Well, it was a long time yet before
you was strong enough t’ play out
doors, an’ it was a hard winter. I
burned every post of the fence around
the south eighty fer firewood afore
it was over. But it seemed like we
had so much t’ be thankful fer that
we was strong t’ care fer any any of
th’ smaller troubles that we come
acrost.
“It really hain’t so bad to look back
at it now after th’ trouble Is over, but
them hard years in Kansas drove
nearly all our neighbors t’ give up
their land an’ move away, broke in
hopes an’ pocketbook. Them of us as
stayed is purty well fixed now, but
we fit fer everything we got. an’ fit
hard, too. An’, O, yes, about th’ caty
logs. Well after you was well an'
things begun t’ take a turn fer th'
better, one night ma brought out that
Chicago book an' laid it on the kitch
en table an’ says: ‘Ezrv, what do you
want t’ do w'ith this?’ An’ I sez: ‘Les
burn it.’ An’ your ma sez: ‘Jest what
I was thinkin’, too.’ An’ so we did
burn it, an’ what’s more, we ain’t
never had one in th’ house since, an'
we never send away fer anything we
can git at any of the stores in Huston,
’cause we want to deal with them as
has an int’rest in the country we live
in, an’ in us people that live dost by.
“Why, you needn’t of put yours in
th’ stove, too, Elsie, I didn't mean—
yes, I don’t know but what it’s jest as
well y’ done it after all.”
Folk Denounces Mail-Order Idea. >
Addressing a meeting of retail mer
chants in Jefferson city recently, Gov
ernor Folk, of Missouri, said:
“We are proud of our splendid
cities, and we want to increase wealth
and population, and we also want our
country towns to grow. We wish the
city merchants to build up, but we
also desire the country merchants to
prosper. I do not believe in the mail
order citizen. If a place is good
enough for a man to live in and to
make his money in, its good enough
for him to spend his money in.
“No merchant can succeed without
advertising in one way or acother.
Patronize your town papers, build
them up, and they will build the town
up in increased trade and greater op
portunities. Do not be afraid that
business is geing to be hurt by the re
cent exposures of wrong-doing in the
commercial world.’’
Medicines in Pneumonia.
Dudley Morgan declares that then*
are some cases of pneumonia w’hich
require only intelligent and systematic
guidance and nursing. Others need
little medicine, but when it is indi
cated it should be given promptly and
energetically. Even in the most try
ing cases there is little else needed
than digitalis, strychnine, and ice. In
nearly all cases of pneumonia It is a
good plan to start with quiet and rest,
unloading of the bowels when neces
sary, a variety of nourishing liquid
food, and an ice bag on the chest in
the region of the pain and congestion,
and also over the precordia if neces
sary. Trying cases are those in which
the patient is a steady or hard drinker.
In pneumonia digitalis should be used
to strengthen and nourish the heart
and to reduce a rapid pulse.—Medical
Record.
Keep Your Money at Home.
Don send money to mail order
houses to deposit. Your home bank
is the only safe place to keep it and
will pay you as good interest as can
be had, and then you run no risk as
in such cases as the “Cash Buyer’s
Union” failure. The home bank will
grant you favors and mail order
houses never do.
Mixture of Many Nations.
Louis N. Parker, the dramatist, was
bora in France; his father was an
American, his mother an English
woman; his first language was Italian
he was educated in Germany.