Newspaper Page Text
HE CHEYEHHE TRAHSPDRTEK
ESTABLISHED 1879.
MAPPETT & MERRITT,
Editors and Proprietors.
INSCRIPTION, $1 PER VEAfl IN ADVANCE
CHEYENNE AND ARAPAHOE AGENCY,
Darlington, Indian Ter
OTHERWISE AND PERSONAL.
Henry George is 47 years old.
AitA.ni Pasha is teaching school at
Colombo, in Ceylon.
CONGRESSMAN REAGAN is Said to be a
w.
ventriloquist of no ordinary power.
The Boston fund for the widow ol
Gen. Hancock lias ceased to grow at
the $8,800 mark.
It is reported that the Order of the
Garter will bo conferred upon the em
peror of China.
A Dublin philanthropist, Timothy
Sexton, left $40,000 for the benefit of
infirm preachers.
T. V. Higginson, the writer, bc-
cause of delicate health, does not allow
himself to go out after dark.
Kaisek Wiuielm expects personally
to attend the military maneuvers of
September next at Strasburg.
BEVIS MARKS SYNAGOGUE.
Mu. Powderly, the Knights of La
bor king, never talks politics. He
hasn't time, he says, to think of it.
The oldest son of Secretary Bayard,
it is stated, will wed in Juno a Miss
Deacon, of Fort Pendleton, W. Va.
Mme. Ciienevard has passed over a
golden purse, with 3,000,000 francs in
it, to the French Academy of Fine Arts.
Rose Coghlan is a neighbor of Sam
uel J. Tilden, having rocontly purchased
& villa adjoining that statesman's home.
Mrs. Ella Wheeler-Wilcox says
it is like waiting for your epitaph to
wait for accepted articles to bo publish
ed by magazines.
Mrs. Julia Ward Howe will suc
ceed her daughter, Mrs. Anagnos, in
the presidency of the Mcta-physical
club of Boston.
Mme. Albani will sing Baron Ton
nyson's odo at the opening of the
colonial exhibition next week. Sir Ar
thur sullivan will conduct the orchestral
rendition, and both tho queen and
Baron Tennyson will bo in attendance.
Prince Bismarck failed to get hia
plover eggs this spring. One hundred
of those eggs havo boon sent to him
from Jover on every birthday anniver
sary for many years, but this season
tho long winter kept tho plovers in tho
south.
The students and alumni of Cornoll
university arc circulating a petition re
questing tho board of trustees to pen
sion Prof. Rochrig, the noted linguist,
on his rotiromont from tho faculty. lie
lias been at tho head of tho Oriental de
partmont in that college for seventeen
years.
Lieut. Gov. Ames, of Massachusetts
gavo away trees on last Arbor day to
any North Easlon pcoplo who would
sot them out. Ho givos the town this
year $2,000 to bo used in planting shade
troes along iho public highways, and
lias purchased twenty-live hundred trees
for that plirposo.
Admiral Maxse, of tho English
navy, pays 3115 a week for his rooms
at a New York hotel. His sorvico and
meals aro oxtra, and must bring his
bill up to noarly 8200 for liimsolf alone.
At anothor hotel a ro tired Californian
pays $80 a day, and John W. Maokey'd
rooms cost him $100 a week.
AnOIcllluilillng in London of Histo
rical Interest Threatened
with Destruction.
Tho Bovis Marks synagogue, the on
ly building of genuine historical inter
est in England which tho Jews can
boast, is at the present moment threat
ened with destruction at the hands of a
portion of its own governing body, to
the dismay of tho majority of its con
gregants and of tho community in gen
eralat least of those of them who pre
fer sentiment and old associations to
merely money considerations and con
venience. "Be vis Marks" is not, as
many erroneously suppose, the first
synagogue ever founded here. The
Jews, who settled in England about A.
D. 750, arc known to have possessed
one in Old Jewry in the earlier portion
of the twelfth century, but tho build
ing, together with all tho other traces
of Hebrew settlement, was swept away
when, a little more than a century
later, at the instance of the pope, tho
whole Jewish colony, numbering near
ly 17,000 persons, was banished the
country. In 1585 Sixtus V. rescinded
the edict against the Jews, but it was
not till 1650, or 370 years after their ex
ile that they ventured to return. The
permission to resettle was accorded, or
at any rate not withheld, by Oliver
Cromwell, the Jews1 great benefactor
of the time, in answer to the prayer of
Monasseh ben Israel, a rabbi much es
teemed by the xirotcctor, who' a few
years later granted him a pension.
No sooner was the now colony founded
than they set about establishing a syna
gogue m King street, Duke's place;
but after forty years' service the build
ing, being found insuflicient for its pur
pose, was pulled down and was replac
ed by the present large and quaint edi
fice in Bcvis Marks.
The section of the Jewish communi
ty who thus succeeded in gaining a foot
hold in England consisted almost ex
clusively of Hebrew "aristocracy"
learned, large-niinded men who had
been merchant princes, philosophers,
and doctors in Spain and Portugal,
trusted and honored by their respective
countries before they too were. thrown
into exile; and they trace back their no
ble line of descent, for no one is
more proud of birth and blood than
your Spanish or Portuguese Jew, and
point out with pride how their ances
tors were men of light or leading, and
power, too, when their brethren ol Ger
many and Poland the later importa
tion into Germany were traticking as
peddlers and money-lenders and such
other miserable occupations as tho per
secution of their oppressors graciously
permitted them to carry on.
Thus the present synagogue of Bovis
Marks (originally Burld's Marks, the
spot occupied by the abbots of Bury) is
the chief, and indeed the only, monu
ment of Anglo-Judica worth preserv
ing on account of its interesting his
torical associations, the only link mnd
ing the latter-day Jew to his much
beloved past. In 1698, or thereabouts,
tho building was began; its main-beam
at one time the mast of a frigate of
the (loet was presented as an unprece
dented mark of royal favor, and appre
ciated as such, by Queen Anne. From
the ceiling were suspended the lamps
and chandeliers which, together with
some of the benches, had belonged to
the old King Street synagogue, and
which had been brought over from
Holland many years before. In 1702
the building, constructed to accommo
date about six hundred worshipers,
was consecrated for divine worship;
and some years later Benjamin Mendez
da Costa, a wealthy merchant, whose
ancestor had been physician to Queen
Catherine of Braganza, purchased the
freehold and transferred it to tho "Holv
Congregation of the Gates of Heaven. n
Among tho members of this syna
gogue in days gono by, names honored
and revered by tho community, are tho
Bornals (now Bornal-Osbornes), tho
Ricardos, tho D'Aguilars, tho Rodri
guezes, tho Mendcz.es, thoMoeattas, tho
I)' Israelis. Hero sat tho older D' Israeli
Isaac, tho author of "Tho Curiosities
of Literature" for many years ono of
tho principal members of tho congrega
tion, until a dispute led to his secession;
and hero bosido him sat his. little son,
tho future Lord Boaconslield, who at
tho ago of 6, after his father's death,
was baptized by Samuel Rogers, the
banker-poet The last ceremony of
special interest held within tho syna
gogue's walls was the celebration of Sir
Montcfiore's centenary, on which occa
sion an old lady present, bent with tho
weight of 101 years, was heard to ex
press the hope (as, leaning on a rela
tive's arm, she was walking from tho
building) that "Sir Moses might live to
be an old man."
With tho deplorable present intention
of the elders of the congregation to de
molish this interesting old place we
have nothing whatever to do; but the
facts of the case are not without inter
est. It appears that the governing
bodj the constitution of which is pecu
liar and of very ancient date, and alto
gether arbitrary and autocratic,
is composed of rich men who, now
living in opulence in tiie West end,
dosiro to pull down the present
building (replacing it for their poorer
brethren they leve behind with a little
synagogue somewhere else), to sell the
extremely valuable site, and with the
money thus obtained to erect a second
Portuguese "shool" in the west. The
opponents of the scheme contend that
though they have no vote in the matter,
their wishes should be consulted; that
if the rich Wesl-cndcrs want a new syn
agogue in their own neighborhood they
can well afford to build one for them
selves, without taking their beloved
brick and mortar record from them:
they contest their warden's right to
deal thus with Da Costa's gift to them
all, and they declare they will appeal
to the charity commissioners for pro
tection, and to whomever else can help
them, well knowing, however, that
their rich opponents by lighting them
can force their hands. How this will
terminate will be known before the
present month expires. Jews are gen
erally credited with an inordinate love
of race association and of money consid
erations; it will be interesting to ob
serve which wrill prevail in this case.
It is to be hoped, if solely from an an
tiquarian point of view, that the old
building may be spared. Pall Mall Gazette
Electric Railways. '
An important feature of electric rail
ways will be the use of their power for
many minor purposes. Not the least
valuable is the lighting of tho cars by
electricity. There is no need to dwell
on the imperfections of the preseut sys
tem of lighting railway-cars. In a lew
drawing-room and sleeping cars the
electric light has been tried with suc
cess only moderate, and dynamos stop
when the train stops. Accumulators
are necessarily bulky, and, though
some progress in their use has been
made abroad, little or nothing has been
done with them here. In an electric
railway the use of the power necessary
for making the cars almost as light as
day will hardly be noticed at the cen
tral station. Electric headlights are
coming into use; the advantages will be
gained at less cost on electric railways.
Tho possibility of heating cars by elec
tricity has been discussed, but nothing
has 3ret been accomplished toward malS
ing the cost anywhere nearly as cheap
as coal. It is probable, however, that
there will be a great advance in this
direction. When wo have electric heat
ing apparatus, tho danger from lire in
case of accident already greatly reduced
by the use of electric lights and iireless
locomotives, will bo at a minimum.
. . . Already the beginning has been
made. The infant art is taking its first
steps short, weak, tottering, to be sure,
yet full of promise of tho growth to
come. Will the public stretch out a
helping hand? Will the public nour
ish the child, not for what it is, but for
what it may be in future years? . . .
Tho steam railway had a harder light
to make than tho olectric railway has
so far had. By its own merit it tri
umphed at last. Tho child survived,
and now as a man is doing a good share
of tho work of the world. Another
child promises in time to come to do
that work bettor. Shall wo not give it
a speedy chance to fulfill tho promises?
Luce on Electric Railways.
Well Applied.
Wife "What is a chestnut, my
dear?"
Husband "A chestnut, lovq, is a
story that has boon told over and over
again. Why?"
Wife "Nothing. Only it's funny
that you should bring a chestnut with
you every time you como homo lato at
night." Lowell Citizen,
A Brazilian Boycott.
When was tho first boycott establish
ed and in what land? Ireland has
o-iven currency to the word and has
made popular the system of getting even
with obnoxious officials. But long be
fore Capt. Boycott was beleaguered in
his house by the irate peasantry whoso
enmity he had incurred the somo
ostracising of other landlords in other
lands had been carried into effect.
Brazil is perhaps tho country which
most people would consider the least
likely to resort to tho boycott, and yet
in the second decade of the present
century it had a very lively and
thorough one. Somo time since a well
known gentleman, of this city, whose
business often takes him to Cuba
heard in Havana considerable talk about
an extraordinary document which the
citizens of a Brazilian town had issued
against religion and its votaries on ac
count of a long an disastrous drought.
He tried hard to obtain a copy of it,
but without avail, until within a few
days past, when he received a clipping
from a paper with the coveted curiosity.
It is in Spanish, and the following is
a translation of it:
The official paper of tho state of
Morelos copies tho following decree,
published in 1820 in the town of
Custhanas, empire of Brazil:
To the Mayor of the Town and
Department op Custhanas: Whereas,
Considering that the Supreme Maker
has not acted rightly toward this prov
ince and town; that only once in the
whole of last year it rained a single
shower, and that during all this winter,
in spite of the religious processions, .no
venas, and prayers, it has not rained a
single drop, and consequently the crop
of chestnuts, on which this department
is dependent for its prosperity, has
been lost:
Resolved, 1. That if, in the perempt
ory term of eight days, to be counted
alter the publication of this decree,
rain does not fall abundantly, nobody
will go to mass or say any prayers.
2. That if the drought still continue
eight days more in addition the churches
and chapels will be set on lire, and
missals and rosaries and. any other ob-
ject of devotion will bo destroyed.
b. That if finally rain does not fall on
a third term of eight days longer the
clerics, monks, nuns, and saintly
women will be put to death; and at
present ample time is given to every
body to count their sins of every kind
and description, that thus the Supreme
Maker will certainly understand with -whom
He has to deal.
This plain avowal of direful events to
follow in the event of rain not falling
appears to have had the effect of lead
ing the clergy to heartier invocations,
for as there is no record of the whole
sale killing of these professors of re
ligion it is supposed that the heavens
opened and the town of Custlianus was
drenched with showers. .New Yorh
Uerald.
Come to Time, Young Man.
Never wedding, over wooing,
Still a love-lorn heart pursuing,
Read you not the wrong you're doing,
In my cheek's pale hue?
All my life with Borrow strewing;
Wed or cease to woo.
Campbell,
a
A Slight Mistake.
They were sitting on tho cable car.
It was on the dummy. The rain had
given the climate a rest for an hour,
and they were going home from -Mary
Anderson.
"Don't," she whispered to him.
"Don't what?"
"Don't press my hand so hard and
take away your arm."
"What do you mean?" he whispered,
and glared across her at a man on the
other side.
"Faro, please?" said the conductor,
and she found she had been squeezing
the conductor's hand, and he well ho
humored her. Chicago Times.
An Inference.
A Frenchwoman confesses to having
attended 722. balls in the offbrt to catch
a husband, and only to havo'caught in
stead bronchitis fourteen limes, pleu
risy thrice, and 120 colds in tho
head. Tho inferonco is plain that she
wears hor dresses too low and dances
very badly.
