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About The Loup City northwestern. (Loup City, Neb.) 189?-1917 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 23, 1915)
TOMTTLI-C® A'OIAMIS NLYILLI BUCK k AUTHOR °f "Tfie CALL oftheCUMBERLANDS”! illustrations c.d. modes COPYRIGHT GY fiFViLLG «,« BITCH I CHAPTER XX—Continued. —10— The little town itself lay dismal and helpless, with its shacks scattered oyer its broken and uneven levels. Dawn, perhaps, found it hardest; for in this one day Dawn had grown up. and tomorrow would bring the boy : whom she now confessed to loving. i though she confessed it with self-con tempt, leading a force to meet that of her own people, fighting to avenge her , father. Juanita, whose eyes could not ; escape ironical reminders when she glanced down at the Christmas pack- j ages, seemed to hear over and over 1 the voice of Anse Havey saying: 'Tin doin' it because ye asks it." She had sought to avert an assassi nation. and it seemed that the effort would precipitate a holocaust Anse was very busy, but he found time to come to her that afternoon. In the hare little hotel lobby the fire light glinted on many rifles as their owners lounged about the hearth. And in Anse she sawr once more the stern side. His face was unsmiling, and in his eyes was that expression which made her realize how inflex- j ibly he would set about the accom- i plishment of the thing he had under- 1 taken. Then, as he spoke to her. a sudden softness came into his eyes. I “God knows I-’m sorry,” he said, “that this thing broke just now. I didn't aim that ye should be no eye witness.” Juanita smiled rather wanly. Old Milt, he told her, would soon be re leased. "We ain’t even goin’ to keep j him in the jailhouse no longer than 1 mornin'. We couldn't convict him. an It would only bring on more trouble ' "Why was he arrested?” she asked blankly. "Just to keep him out of mischief overnight,” he smiled. “Even the law can be used for strategy.” "What will happen when the Mc Briars come back?” she demanded in a shaken voice. He shook his head. "I can’t hardly say,” he replied. But the next morning Anse Havey came again and cautioned the two women not to leave their ‘rooms and not to keep their shutters open. All that day the town lay like a turtle, tight drawn into its shell. Streets were empty. Doors were locked and shutters barred. But toward evening, to the girl's bewilderment, she saw Haveys riding out of town instead of into it. Soon there were no more horses at the racks. By night the place which was to be assaulted to morrow seemed to have been aban doned by its defenders. Old Milt McBriar had ridden out in the morning, freed but wrathful, to meet the men who were hurrying in. The figure of Bad Anse Havey she caw often from her window, but for the most part the force of Haveys had evaporated. Then followed another wretched night, and with forenoon the snow wrapped town settled down to the empty silence of a cemetery, but with early afternoon the new procession began to come in. A long and con tinuous stream of McBriar horsemen, each armed to the teeth, rode past the hotel and went straight to the court house. Then she heard again the sound she had neard on her first night in the mountains, only now it came from a hundred throats. It was the McBriar yell, and after It came a scattering of rifle and pistol shots. The clan was going away again and shooting up the town as they went, but what had happened down there at the courthouse? CHAPTER XXI. Later she heart the story. The Mc Eriars had con.e expecting battle They had found every road open and the town deserted. For a time they h%d gone about looking for trouble, but found no one to oppose them, 'then Old Milt and his son had rid <i*sn to the courthouse to demand the Keys of the jail. They found Judge Sidering sitting in the little office, and 1»ith him, quite unarmed qnd without *«cort, sat Bad Anse Havey. When the two McBriars, backed by a score d armed men. broke fiercely into the room, others massed at their backs, crowding doorway and hall. Judge Sidering greeted his visitors as though no intimation had ever reached him that they were coming vfith a grievance. "Come in. Milt, and have a chair,” he invited. "Cheer, hell!” shouted Milt McBriar. "Give me the keys ter thet jailhouse, ail’ give ’em ter the quick!” Opening the drawer of his desk as If he had been asked for a match, Judge Sidering twos out the big iron key to the outer door and the smaller brass key to the little row of cells. He tossed the two across to Milt in a matter-of-fact fashion. Five minutes later the McBriar chief was back trembling with rage. He had found the jail empty. "If you're lookin' for Luke Thixton, Milt,” said the judge calmly, “the high sheriff took him to Louisville yester day for safe-keepin’.” The answer was a bellow of rage. Old Milt McBriar threw forward his rifle. Anse looked up and spoke slowly: “I reckon it wouldn’t profit ye much to harm us. Milt. We ain’t armed, an' it would bring on a heap of trouble." Outside rose an angry chorus of voices. The news that the jail was empty had gone through the crowd. For a time the McBriar stood there debating his next step. The town seemed at his mercy. Seemed! That word gave him pause. The way home lay through Havey territory, which might mean twenty miles of solid ambush. Anse Havey sat too quietly for Milt's ease of mind. Was he bait ing some fresh tiap? The old intriguer felt baffled and at sea. He had grown accustomed to weighing and calculating with guileful deliberation. He balked at swift and impulsive action. Moreover, if he de bated long, he might not be able to control his men. He looked up—to sec little Milt, who was fighting back the crowd at the door and locking them out. Beyond the panels could be heard loud swearing and the impa tient shuffling of many feet. “What shall we do, son?” inquired the older man of the younger. His voice bad a note of appeal and break ing power. When Young Milt had ridden out of Peril no feudist in the hills had borne a heart fuller of hatred and hunger for vengeance, but that was because of his father. Now his father was free. For Luke Thixton he had j a profound contempt. He saw in the situation only a game of wits in which [ Anse Havey was winner. “Well,” he replied with a grin he could not repress, "hit looks right smart ter me like thar hain't nothin’ to do but ride on back home an' try again next time.” That counsel in the end prevailed. Outside there had been a short, sharp struggle with a mutinous spirit. These men had come for action and they did net want to ride back foiled, but the word of Old Milt had stood unchal lenged too long to fail now. Yet he led back a grumbling following and bore a discounted power. They could net forget that a Havey had worsted i him. So the spirit of the men who had j come to fight vented itself in the yell ! and the random shots to which there ; was no reply, and again a train of ■ horsemen were on their way into the j hills. ‘ When it was all over and Juanita j sat there in her empty school she was ! realizing that, after all, the desperate ; moment had only been deferred and i must come with absolute certainty. I Olristmas was only two days off and I her gun-rack was empty. When she had come home there had not been a single weapon there. There would be no Christmas tree now! The beribVioned packages lay in a useless pile. Had school been in ses sion, she knew fhat the desks would have been as enlpty as the gun-rack. The whole turtleJike life had drawn in its head and the countryside lay as though besieged. On Anse Havey’s book-shelves were new volumes, for Juanita was feeding his scant supply, and a softer type of poetry was being added to his frugal and stern repertoire. A number of men left the mountains and went into exile elsewhere. These were the wit nesses who must testify against Luke Thixton and whose lives would not have been worth a nickel had they stayed at home. Then came Christmas (lay itself, bleak and soggy with the thaw that had set in and the moody dreariness of the sky. The sun seemed to have despaired and made its course spirit lessly from dawn to twilight, crawling dimly across its daily arc. Brother Anse Talbott came over to the school and found both women sit ting apathetically by an untrlmmed flr tree amid a litter of forgotten pack ages. The children of Tribulation were having the sort of Christmas they had always had—a day of terror and empty cheerlessness. "Hit seems like a right smart pity fer them children ter be plumb, tee totally disapp'inted,” mused the old preacher. “S'pose now ye put names on them gewgaws an’ let me jest sorter ride round an’ scatter ’em.’’ I "You dear old saint!” cried Juanita, suddenly roused out of her apathy. "But you’ll freeze to death an’ get drowned in some ford." "Thet’s all right.” the preacher an swered briefly. “I reckon I kin go ther route.” It took Good Anse Talbott three days of battle 'vith quicksand and mire to finish that mission. At each house he told them that Juanita Hol land had sent him, and the girl was canonized afresh in hearts old and young, back in roadless coves and on bleak hillsides. • *••••• Every evening found Anse Havey seated before Jur-nita'^ hearth, study ing the flicker of the firelight on her face. Every detail of her expression became to him as something he had always known and worshiped. Some day Malcolm would come back FROM ALL PARTS Bachelors over twenty-live years of age were taxed id England in the sev enteenth century—£12 10s for a duke, and for a common person, one shilling. There are 15 German Rhodes schol arships at Oxford, each of $1,250. ten able for three years, the holders to be nominated by the German emperor. in Australia there has been started a popular movement for the preserva tion of the giant' strlngybark" trees ot that country, the tallest in the world. Those who wait 2,500,000 years will witness a repetition of the phenome non of February, 1866, when there was no full moon. Forty-nine years has passed already. The hammer used at the sale of Ger man prize ships In London was the same as that used in 1855, when the enemy's ships seized were sold. At the close of the sale the auctioneer presented this hammer to the mm-ahni of the admiralty. H. W. Lovell. A gold-lettered inscription on the ham mer recalled the Crimean war. —and marry her—and then—at that point Bad Anse Havey refused to fol low his trend of thought further. He only ground his teeth. “Ye damn fool.” he told himself. "That ain't no reason why ye shouldn't make the most of today. She's right here now, an’ she’s sun an' moon an star shine and music an’ sweetness.' She did not know, and he gave her no hint, that in these times, with plots and counterplots hatching on both sides of the ridge, he never made that journey in the night without inviting death. He was walking miles through black woodland trails each evening to relievo for an hour or two her loneli ness and to worship with sealed lips and a rebellious heart. On the night before he was to go to Peril to attend the trial of Luke Thix ton he came with a very full and heavy heart. He knew that it might be a farewell. Tomorrow he must put to the test all his hold on his people and all his audacity of resolution. He stood at the verge of an Austerlitz or a Waterloo, and he had undertaken the thing for no reason except that it had pleased her to command it. He knew that tmong his own fol lowers there were smiles for the power which a "furrin” woman had come to wield over him, and if one failure marred his plans those smiles would become derisive. It was weak ness to go on as he was going, gazing dumbly at her with boundless adora tion he dared not voice. Tonight he would bluntly tell her that he was do ing these things because he loved her; that, while he was glad to do them, he could not let her go on misunder standing his motives. But when he reached the school she rose to receive him, and he could see only the slimness of her graceful fig ure and the smile of welcome on her lips, and the man who had never been recreant before to the mandate of resolution, became tongue-tied. She vheld out a hand, which he took with more in his grip than the hand clasp of friendship, but that she did not notice. "Anse,” she laughed, "I've had a let ter from home today urging me to give up and come back. They don’t realize how splendidly I am going to succeed, thanks to your help. I want you to go with me soon and mark some more trees for felling. It won’t be long now before they can begin build ing again.” "1 wonder," he said, looking at her with brows that were deeply drawn and eyes full of suffering, “if ye'll ever have time to stop talkin’ about the school for a little spell an’ remember that I’m a human bein’.” “Remember that you’re a human being?” she questioned in perplexity. She stood there with one hand on the back of her chair, her face puzzled. He decided at once that this expres sion was the most beautiful she had ever worn, and he sturdily held that conviction until her eyes changed to laughter, when he forswore his alle giance to the first fascination for the second. “Are you sure you are a human be ing?” she teased. “When you wear that sulky face you are only half hu man. I ought to make you stand in the corner until you can be cheerful.” “I reckon,” he said a little bitterly, “if ye ordered me to stand in the cor Christmas Was Only Two Days Off and Her Gun Rack Was Empty. ner I’d just about do it I reckon that’s about how much manhood I’ve got left." But he laughed, too, in the next mo ment. The morning of the trial dawned on a town prepared to face a bloody day Long before train-time crowds had drifted down to the station. As though by common consent, the tycBriars stood on one side of the track and the Haveys on the other. For an hour they massed there, low ering of face, yet quietly w'aiting. Then the whistle shrieked across the river and each crowd moved a little forward, hands tightened on rifles, awaiting the supreme moment. The deputy sheriffs came out of the depot and stood waiting between the two groups with a strained assumption of unconcern. But when the train ar rived it carried an extra coach, and at sight of it the McBriars groaned and knew once more they were defeated. They had come to wrest a prisoner from a sheriff’s posse and encountered trained soldiery. Behind the opened sashes of the coach they saw a solid mass of blue overcoats and brown service-hats. Every window bristled with rifle-barrels and fixed bayonets. Then, while the train was held beyond its usual brief stop, acd while Jiose rifle-barrels were trained impartiallv on Haveys and McRriars, a line ol soldiers begun pouring out into the roadbed and forming cordons along each side of the track. Beth lines moved slowly but unwaveringly for ward, pressing back the crowds before their urgent bayonets. Two wicked-looking gatling guns were unloaded from the baggage car. and tending them as men might handle beloved pejs, came squads whose capes were faced with artillery red. Shortly a compact little procession in column of fours, with the gatling guns at its front and a hollow square at its center, was marching briskly to the courthouse. In the hollow square went the defendant, handcuffed to the" sheriff. Without delay or confusion the gatling guns were put in place, one commanding the courthouse square and one casting its many-eyed glance up the hillside at the back. Then, with the bayonets of sentries crossed at the doors, the bell in the cupola rang while Judge Sidering walked calmly Into the building and instructed the sheriff to open court. His honor had directed that every man save officials who sought admis sion should be disarmed at the door. Luke Thixton bent forward in his chair and growled into the ear of Old Milt McBriar, who sat at his left. “I’ve got as much chanst hyar as a fish on a hilltop. Hain't ye goin' ter do nothin’ fer me?”—and Milt looked about helplessly and swore under his breath. One onlooker there had not been searched. Young Jeb bore the creden tials of a special deputy sheriff, and under his coat was a holster with its flap unbuttoned. While the panel wa3 being selected; while lawyers wran gled and witnesses testified; while the court gazed off with half-closed eye3, rousing only to overrule or sustain a motion, young Jeb sat with his arms on the table, and never did his eyes leave the face of the accused. It was a very expeditious trial. Judge Sidering glanced at the faces of Old Milt and young Jeb, and had no desire to prolong the agony of those hours. The defense half-heartedly re lied upon the old device of a false alibi, which the state promptly punc tured. Even the lawyers seemed in haste to be through, and set a limit or. their arguments. At the end his honor read brief in structions. and the panel was locked in its room. Then the McBriars drew a little closer around the chair where Old Milt waited, and the militia captain strengthened his guard outside and began unostentatiously sprinkling uni formed men through the dingy court room until the liodden-gray throng was flecked with blue. At length there came a rap on the door of the juryroom, and instantly the low drone of voices fell to a hush. His honor poured a glass of water from the chipped pitcher at his elbow, while Luke Thixton and Milt McBriar, for all their immobility of feature, braced themselves. Like some rest less animal of many legs, the rough throng along the courtroom benches scraped its feet on the floor. Young Jeb shifted his chair a little so that the figure of the defendant might be in an uninterrupted line of vision. His right hand quietly slipped under his coat, and his lingers loosened a weapon in its holster and nursed the trigger. Then, with a dragging of shoe-leath er, the twelve "good men and true" shambled to a semicircle before the bench, gazing stolidly and blankly at the rows of battered law books which served his honor as a background. There they stood awkwardly in the gaze of all. Judge Sidering glanced into the beetling countenance of their foreman and inquired in that bored voice which seems a Judicial affecta tion even in questions of life and death: "Gentlemen, have you agreed upon a verdict?” The foreman nodded. The sheet of paper, which he passed to the clerk, had been signed by more than one juror with a cross because he could not write. “We, the jury,” read the clerk in a clear voice, “find the defendant, Luke Thixton, guilty as charged in the in dictment—” There, although he had not yet reached the end, he indulged in a dramatic pause, then read on the more important clause in the terms of the Kentucky law which leaves the placing of the penalty in the hands of the jurors—"and fix his punishment at death.” As though relieved from a great pressure, young Jeb McNash withdrew his hand from his holster and settled back in his chair with fixed muscles. Judge Sidering's formal question broke in on the dead quiet, "So say you all, gentlemen?” and twelve shaggy heads nodded wordless affirma tion. Soldiers filed in from the rear. In less than thirty seconds the prisoner had disappeared. Outside the gatling guns remained in place, and the troops patrolled the streets. For two days the McBriars stayed in town, but the troops lingered long er, and in that time Luke had again been taken back to Louisville. Once more Old Milt led back a dis gruntled faction with no more spirited a program than to go home and bide its time again. When they brought Luke back to bang him, his friends would have one final chance. A seeming of quiet, under which hot wrath smoldered, settled over hill and cove, but a new note began to run through the cabins of the McBriar de pendents. It was a note of waning faith and loyalty for their chief. Old Milt read the signs and felt that his dominion was now a thing upon which decay bad set its seal, and un SNAP SHOTS Tank Beverly says his notion ot a "tightwad” is the pitch player who believes he can save an unprotected jack. Buck Kirby says his ambition is to see a race for office between a poli tician named “BiU” and another called "Honest John.” Buck says there is nothing he enjoys so much as the spectacle ot the intelligent voter in a hole where he has to think for him self. A recent official estimate gave Vene zuela a population of 2,812,668. No actor can compete witb a baby when it comes to entertaining the women. A jury is like the injured husband in the respect that it is always the last to find It out Here is another inviolable rule: No barber shop should sell ice cream in connection with its regular business. We have noticed that the men who die for women nearly always do so at the hands of an injured husband. de» iiit- gfw.e "'ace he masked a break ng heart His star was setting and since he was no longer young and ut toriy incapable of bending, he sick ened slowly through the wet winter, and men spoke of him as an invalid With Milt “ailin'," there was no one to take up the reins of clan govern ment. and those elements that bad been held together only by his iron dominance began drifting asunder. One mill day when a group of Mo Briars met with their sacks of grist at a water-mill, someone put the ques tion: “Who’s a-g«n’ ter go down thar an' take Luke Thixtca away from ther Haveys now thet Old Milt's down an out ?" There was a long silence, and at last a voice drawled: "Hit hain't a goin ter be me. What’s Luke Thixton ter me, anyhow? He didn't nuver lend me no money." “I reckon thar’s a heap o’ sense in thet,” answered another. “ 'Pears like, when I come ter recollect, mos’ of ther fightin’ an’ fursin’ I’ve done in my time hain’t been in my own quarrels nohow." And slowly that spirit spread. When Anso Havey went over to the school one day Juanita took him again to the rifle-rack, now once more well filled. “Have a look, my lord bar His Honor Had Directed That Every Man—Save Officials—Should Be Dis armed at the Door. barian.” she laughed. "Mars is pay ing me tribute. So shall it ever be with tyranny.” Slowly, and one by one, Anse Havey took up the pieces and examined them. "It ain’t only Mars that's paying ye tribute,” he thought, but he only said: "That's all right. I seem to see more McBriar guns there than Havey guns It would suit me all right if ye got the last one of ’em." “Hadn’t you as well hang yours there, too?” she teased. “I’m still willing to give you the honors of war.” But he only smiled, ’i’ll hang mine up last of all, I reckon. Luke Thix ton ain't hung yet, and there’s other clouds a brewin’ besides that.” “What clouds?” she asked. “There was a bunch of surveyors through here lately,” he replied slow ly. "They just sort of looked ’round and went away. Some day they'll come back.” "And then?” Anse Havey shrugged his shoulders "1 may need my gun.” he said. Not until It became certain that he must die did Old Milt send for his son. or even permit hipi to be told of his illness. But just as the winter’s siege was ending Young Milt came home, and two days later the mountains heard that the old feudist was dead. Brother Anse Talbott and Juanita and a doctor who had come from Lexington were witnesses to that leave-taking. They saw the old man beckon feebly to the boy. Young Milt came and sat on the edge of the bed, schooling his features as he waited the final injunctions which, by his code, would be mandatory for life. They all waited to hear the old lion break out in a final burst of vindictive ness, to see him lay upon his boy's young shoulders the unfinished or deals of his hatreds. But it was the eye of the father, not the feudist, that gazed up from the pillow. His wasted fingers lay affectionately on his son’s knee and his voice was gentle. "Son," said the old man, "I'd love ter hev ye live at peace ef ye kin. I’ve done tried ther other way an’ hit’s kilt me. I’d ruther ye'd let my fights be buried along with my body. Anse Havey’s goin’ ter run things in these mountings. He's a smarter man than me. I couldn’t never make no peace with Anse Havey, but the things that’s always stood betwixt us lays a long way back. Mebby you an’ him mought pull together an' end ther feud. I leaves thet with you; but hit took death ter make me see hit—” Here he broke off exhaustedly, and for a time seemed fighting for breath. At last he added; ‘T’ve knowed all along thet Luke killed Fletch McXash. I thought I’d ought ter tell ye.” A week after the death of the old leader Young Milt rode over to the house of Anse Havey, and there he found Job McNash. The two young men looked at each other without ex pression. Just after the death of his father Jeb would not willingly have renewed their quarrel, and as for Young Milt, he no longer felt resent ment. ’’Anse,” said the heir to McBriar leadership, "I rid over here ter offer ye my hand. I've done found out that Luke is es guilty es hell. I didn’t be lieve hit afore. So fur es I’m con cerned.’ he kin hang, an’ I’m goin' ter tell every McBriar man that will harken ter me ther same thing. So fur as I’m concerned,” went on the lad "I’m against the shootin' of anv man from the la'rel." Just as the earliest flowers began to peep out with shy laces in the woods and the first softness came to the air men began rearing a scaffold in the courthouse yard at Peril. One day a train brought Luke Thix ton back to the hills, but this time only a few soldiers came with him. and they wer« not needed Juanita tried to forget ifto r»rnili-ance of that Friday, but she could mX, *ji al! the larger boys were absent from school, and all day Thursday the road had been sprinkled with horses and wag ons. She knew with a shudder that they were going to town to see the hanging. A gruesome fascination ot interest attached to so unheard of an event as a McBriar clansman dying on a Havey scaffold with his people stand ing by idie. But Luke Thixtou. going to his death there among enemies, went without flinching, and his snarling lips even twisted a bit derisively when he mounted the scaffold, as they had twisted when he declined Good Anse Talbott's ministrations in the jail. Since he must die among enemies he would give them no weakness over which to gloat in memory. He raised his head, and his snarl turned slowly and unpleasantly into a grin of contempt, and his last words were a picturesque curse called down alike on the heads of the foes who put him to death and on the false friends who had failed him. Afterward Young Milt and Bad Anse shook hands, and the younger man said to the older: “Now that I've proved to ye that I meant what I said, 1 reckon we can make a peace that'll endure a spell, can’t we?” And Anse answered: “Milt. I've been hopin' we could ever since the day we watched for the feller that aimed to burn down the school." CHAPTER XXM. That spring new buildings went up at the school and brave rows of flow ers appeared in the garden. At first her college had been a Kin dergarten in effect, but now as Juani ta stood on the porch at recess she wondered if any other schoolmistress had ever drawn about her such a strange assortment of pupils. There were little tots in bright calico, glory ing in big bows of cotton hair-ribbon —but submitting grudgingly to tht combing of the hair they sought to adorn. There were larger boys and girls, too, and even a half-dozen men just now pitching horseshoes and smoking pipes—and they also were learning to read and write. In the afternoons women rode in on mules and horses or came on foot, and Juanita taught them not only letter*! and figures, but lessons looking to cleaner and more healthful cabins. May came with smiles and songs in the sky from sunrise to sunset, and in the woods, where the moisture rose and tender greens were sending out their hopeful shoots, the wild flowers unfolded themselves. Then Juanita Holland and Anse Havey would go to gether up to the ridge and watch the great awakening across the brown and gray humps of the hills, and under their feet was a carpet of glow'ng petals. , Anse Havey had never had such a companionship, and hidden things be gan to waken in him. So when she stood there, with the spring breeze caressing the curling tendrils ai her temples, and blowing her gingham skirt about her slim ankles, and pointed off. smiling, to his house, he dropped his head in mock shame. “ ‘Only the castle moodily gloomed to itself apart,’" she quoted in accu sation, and the man laughed boyishly, "I reckon ye haven't seen the castle lately,” he said. “Ye v.-ouldn’t hardly know it. It’s gettin’ all cleaned up an’ made civilized. The eagle's nest is turnin’ into a sure-enough bird cage ” "Who’s changing now?” she ban tered. "Am 1 civilizing von or”—her eyes danced with badinage—"are you preparing to get married?" His face flushed and then became almost surly. "Who'd marry me?" he savagely de manded. “I’m sure 1 don’t know,” she teased. “Whom have you asked?" He bent a little forward and said slowly: “Once ye told me I was wasting my youth. Ye ’lowed I ought to be captain of my soul. If I found a woman that I wanted and she wouldn’t have me— what ought I to do about it?" ' There are two courses prescribed in all the correspondence schools, and both are perfectly simple," she an nounced with mock gravity. “One Is simply to take the lady first and ask her afterward. The other is even easier; get another girl.” “Oh," he said. He was hurt because she had either not seen or had pre tended not to see his meaning She had not grasped the presumptuous dream and effrontery of his heart. His voice for a moment became enigmatical as he added: “Sometimes 1 think ye’ve played hell in thesc mountains.” That spring silent forces were at work in the hills; as silent and less beneficent than the stirring sap and the brewing of showers. Three men in the mountains were now fully convinced that what the world needs the world will have, and they were trying to find a solution to the question which might make their own people sharers in the gain, in stead of victims. These three were Anse and Milt and Jeb, and their first step was the effort to hold landowners in check, and make them slow to sell and guarded in their bargaining. (TO BE CONTINUED.) POSTSCRIPTS Dipping in a soiution of alum will tireproof paper candle or lamp shades. The development of a practical gas turbine engine is claimed in Switzer land. A new electric fan can be screwed into a light socket and will operate at any angle. If a box six feet deep were filled with sea water which was allowed to evaporate there would be two Inches of salt on the bottom of the box. Cotton growing is being developed extensively in Turkey. A machine that takes up but little apace has been invented to wash and scrub golf balls.^ A process for attaching glass let ters to tombstones has been patented by an Indiana inventor. An English scientist has brought out a new electrical process for coating iron or steel with lead. Boiled water has been found an ex cellent disinfectant for bullet wounds by a French surgeon THE EUROPEAN WAR A YEAR AGO THIS WEEK Dec. 20, 1914. Von Hindenburg advanced fu ther toward Warsaw. Russians crossed the Bzura. burning the bridges. Serbians and Montenegrins again invaded Bosnia. Turks made gains near Lake Urumiah. Allied fleets bombarded interior forts of the Dardanelles. Russians drove Turn toward Van. Belgian provinces agreed to pay tax to Germany. Dec. 21, 1914. Allies extended offensive oper ations in west, gaining in center. Russians won over Turks in Armenia, capturing equipment. Allied aviators dropped bombs in Brussels and made night attack near Ostend. Chile protested against viola tions of her neutrality by German navy. Germans driven across border of North Poland. Dec. 22, 1914. Germans claimed to have stopped allies in west. Germans accused of shelling hospital in Ypres. Russian army threatened rail way to Thorn and Germans re formed to protect it. Von Hindenburg’s left thrert ened by new invasion of German;-. Germans crossed branches Bzura and Rawka rivers. Austrians defeated in the Car pathians. Arabs menaced Christians in Hodeida and French consul was seized. Allied fleets bombarded German positions on Belgian coast. French destroyer shelled Turks. Allied fleets shelled Kilid 3ahr Many Austrian soldiers killed in troop train accident. Dec. 23, 1914. Allies made slight gains in west Austrians defeated in southern Galicia. Portuguese retreated before the Germans in Angola, Africa. Turkish army left Damascus and marched on Suez canal. Russian destroyers in Black sea bombarded Turkish villages. King of Belgians sent message of thanks to Americans. Dec. 24, 1914. British using new howitzers in west: French artillery demolishes German trenches. French cruiser damaged by Aus trian torpedo. French submarine sunk by Aus trian shore batteries. German aviator dropped bomb in Dover. Germany denied French charge of hiring neutral ships to lay mines in Mediterranean. Dec. 25, 1914. Unofficial Christmas along much of the western front, the allies and Germans in some instances ex changing gifts and visits. French shelled the outer forts of Metz. Civilians of East Prussia began movement toward interior of prov ince. Russo-Turkish operations were stopped by intense cold. Two German aviators fiew up the Thames. Dec. 26, 1914. British made naval and air at tack on German fleet without im portant results. Zeppelin dropped bombs In Nancy, German aeroplanes made raid in Russian Poland and French aviators attacked Metz. Fighting in Flanders was halted by dense fog. Russians made gains In the south. French attacked Austrian naval base at Pola in the Adriatic. Germany notified neutral nations their consuls in Belgium would not be recognized further. Unqualifiedly False. “Skinner boasts that he never lets anybody get ahead of him—that he takes nobody’s dust.” "Skinners a falsifier; he takes everybody's dust he can lay his hands on.”—Boston Tran script. Driven to Desperation. “I am so tired of being conventional and customary and correct,” stated H. H. Harsh, “that one of these days 1 shall stop right in front of a church and in a firm voice ejaculate ‘Drat!’ ” —Kansas City Star. His Opinion of Brown. Smart Young Man—“What do you think of Brown?” Indignant Old Gen tleman—"Brown, sir! He is one ot those people that pat you on the back before your face, and hit you in the eye behind your back!”—Tit-Bits. True Happiness. To watch the corn grow and the blossom set, to draw hard breath over plowshare and spade, to read, to think, to love, to hope, to pray—these are the things to make man happy.— R us kin. Chinese View of Americans. An American teacher in Peking re peats the interesting summary ol Americans made by one of her pu pils, as follows: “The Americans are quite clean, like the Japanese, and eat clean food, so they have little time to catch ill. Americans take theii wives whenever they travel. Most ol the Europeans have beards, but the Americans shave evary day.” Optimistic Thought. The harmony of men is a strong.* defense than walla of stone.
