Newspaper Page Text
10
MONEY MAKING
IN ASIA.
By Frank G, Carpenter,
•■ •; The representatives of a number of ; big
.•„. American syndicates are now on their way
• ..' across the Pacific to investigate the possi
;"• bilities of investment and speculation in
China, Korea and Japan. One of these is
the lion. George B. Williams, who was for
/ ." years connected with the Japanese Govern
ment as one of its foreign advisers, ana
'■."■who later on was the legal adviser of the
:" Equitable Life Insurance Company in Lon
... don. Another is Chester A. Holcomb,
; ' who was long associated with our legation
•' :in . Peking, and who is well posted upon
"'.China and the Chinese. In addition to
:;" these I hear of scores of individuals who
.- : propose to go to China and Korea in order
: to be able to take advantage of the changed
•V conditions consequent upon the carrying
' out of the new treaty, and a number of old
.-' schemes will probably be revived. It was
'. . only seven years ago that Wharton Bar
.ker raised a fund of $50,000,000 to build
• railroads and to do banking for the Chi
• .ne.se. He has, I understand, been in cor
'•'..respondence with Li Hung Chang since
then, and he may now again come to the
.front. I have met a dozen young . men
• lately who have told me that they were
about to start to Asia in order to get em
ployment as mechanics or engineers on
the" new railroads, and I receive letters
I "every day as to the chances for Americans
I " and American investments in these coun
••- tries. The situation is undoubtedly big j
• with possibilities. It is, however, far dif
ferent from what people believe, and in
• • this letter I will attempt to give some- |
' thine; concerning it.
'.. The indemnity from China will probably
••" create a boom in Japan, and especially in
■.* Tokio, the capital. When the . Franco
,'". Prussian war was concluded every German
'. '■ thought the money paid by the French !
• : would all be spent in Berlin, and the peo- j
.'" "'fie rushed by the thousands from all parts j
"• the empire to take advantage of it. Ber- j
• Jin in 1850 had less than 500.000 people, and
>■ • before she went to war with ranee she had
" only 750.000. Three years after the settle- I
i went of the war her population numbered I
968,000, and in 1880 she had already more !
than 1,000,000. She has now, with her sub- |
' urbs, nearly 3,000,000, and she stands next j
to London among the great cities of the
world. The war was succeeded by an , era
of speculation in Berlin. Stocks "and real
estate jumped upward, and it was so until
".'the panic of 1873, when there was a col
. lapse. The city soon recovered, however,
, and it is now one of the most prosperous of
the world. The same thing will be re
• prated in Tokio. Prices will advance and
real estate is bound to go up. An era of
• speculation will probably follow, and the
. roan who goes in now and sells out quick
•'• will probably do well. The Japanese nave
, • their stock exchanges, and their water
s' . works stock, their railroad stocks and their
other stocks are regularly quoted in the
, newspapers. Many of the companies have
..been paying big dividends, and this is 1
..especially so of the banks.
The seaports have been steadily growing,
• ■ jinfl real estate in these ought to be good.
Take, for instance, ' Yokohama. It was a j
fishing village when Commodore Perry first \
came to the country. It has now a popula- !
tion of more than 100.000, and it is a town j
• of water works, gas and newspapers.
'. Tokio has now more than "1,000,000 peo
■ ple-, and the probability is that it contains !
more than a million and a half. It is only I
fourteen miles from Yokohama, through a j
•thickly settled country, and an electric
; •; railroad built between the two points would
• undoubtedly pay.
At present there are no electric railroads
. . in Tokio, and there are no streetcar lines
'■■ . in Yokohama. The field for electric rail
roads is practically uncultivated, and by
„ /'the new treaty it would be impossible for
.' Americans to engage in such work outside
• ; of. the treaty ports. Take the town of i
".•'■Osaka, in the central part of the empire.
• "It has, with its suburbs, 1,200,000 people,
and there is not an electric railroad in it. \
■ It lies sixteen miles back from the sea- i
..coast, and it is connected by railroad with I
.'.the town of Kobe. Kobe was very small i
. • -at the time that Japan was opened, by j
•; the census of 1890 it contained 136.000 peo- I
pie. An electric railroad between Kobe and
- - Osaka ought to pay. This part of Japan
.is one succession of villages, and only a
t - few miles west of Osaka is the great city
• of Kioto, which was for years the capital
of Japan, and which is now as big as
Washington or Cleveland. If an electric
,= line were stretched from Kobe to Osaka |
and thence on to Kioto.it would' strike
villages at almost every mile of travel, and
. ' it would accommodate a population of
fully 2,000,000 of people. | .The Japanese are
great travelers. They make long excui
•sions over the country to visit the most
• sacred temples and shrines, and I met
hundreds of families walking along the
roads from one sacred point to another.
• " The railroad cars were well filled, and
these electric roads would pick up many
parties on these trips of religion and
pleasure combined. As to the electric
. light field, that is also great. The 40,000,
--000 people of the Japanese empire live, to
; a large • extent, in villages and cities.
There are few gas plants, and the chief
lighting is done with coal oil. i Electric
.lights could be put in without much ex
pense, and in the large cities at very low
; rates. The telephone is rapidly coming
into use. There are a large number in
Osaka and Tokio, and the rates for service
in the Japanese capital are $35 in silver or
$17 50 in gold per year. "-. : - • .<
There will probably now be an increased
demand from Japan for American goods.
" The country already takes $14,000,000 worth
of American raw cotton every year. It has
• been, buying, and will continue to buy,
- American machinery, but the great trade
between America and Japan in the future
. • is to be in shipping American raw mate
. rials to Japan and bringing back Japanese
..products to America. The money to be
made by Americans will be largely through
; . their better knowledge of the American
markets and American needs.
,>' The settlement :of the war will bring
about a great change in China, and from
•" now on the empire will 1 probably be slowly
. -.but. steadily opened. The making of Nan
king a treaty port will give a new foreign
, settlement at that point, : two hundred
.jj miles up the Yang-tse-Kiang. . The Gov
• ernment will be obliged to cede a certain
• amount of land here to the foreigners, and a
little foreign city will spring up at this
point, such as have already sprung up at
every open port. In Canton there is an
-•;. island which is given up to the foreigners.
At HanKow the foreign concession covers,
I" judge, at least a square mile, and at
Shanghai many foreigners have made for
. times out of the rise of the real estate in
. the foreign concession.- There are foreign
, settlements at Tientsin, at Kiukiang and
at Chink'ang, and in these property is
worth much < more than >■ in the • Chinese
cities themselves. These concessions are
• governed by the foreign Consuls, and the
Chinese ' like to / obtain ■ property within
them if : they, can, as this frees them from
the exactions of the Chinese officials and
puts them under foreign law. These con ■
cessions are much like foreign, cities.
' They have modern houses. Their streets
are macadamized and they are kept in or
der by being smoothed with heavy rollers
which are drawn by hundreds .of Chinese.
They have their.. own policemen and are
. , by all. odds the most * desirable places tin
China in which to live. The" city of Nan- j
king is about . five miles : back from , the
river and is one" of the richest cities in
_ China. .It* was for - years the capital* of
• ' Ghina, and it is in the heart of one of the
richest of the Chinese provinces. The for
eign concession may be on the river or it
.- may be on the edge of the city. Wherever
it is the land is almost certain I to « increase
_ in value, and an investment in it ought to
.be good: • ,; ... .--;,,;
". -Those, best posted on the Chinese char
. : acter say that this war will . be followed by
" a great military activity throughout. .the'
■ b-hinese Empire. - New gunworks will beat
• -on.cc started. A ; new navy will be con
structed, and there will be a great demand
for all kinds of machinery for the making
of arms and the munitions of war. There
are now more than 2000 men at work in
the shops at Shanghai. An equal number
are probably employed in the gunworks at
Tientsin, and the Foochow shipyards will
be pushed to their utmost capacity. The
Chinese have seen the necessity for rail
roads, and their lack of ability to move
their troops without them. The first road
to be built will probably be one from Tient
sin to Hankow, and thence to Canton. This
has been planned for years, and it will tap
a territory containinghundredsof millions
of people. The work of getting such con
cessions will be slow, and it is very doubt
ful whether foreigners will be allowed to
build railroads. If they should be permit
ted to do so the field for electricity and
steam is practically unlimited, and such a
revolution in railroad building and manu
facturing will take place as will turn the
remainder of the industrial world upside
down. I don't believe the Chinese will do
this at present. They move slowly, but it
will come eventually. They will, however,
have a great trouble in raising the money
to pay Japan, and there is no telling what
may be squeezed out of the government at
this time. Think of cities of 100,000,
500.000 and 1,000,000 within a few miles of
each other.
Think of a country as big as the United
States, and containing about eight times as
many people, with no railroads whatever
and no decent wagon roads — a country in
most places as flat as a floar and well fitted
for railroads without grading, and you
have something of the condition of China
to-day. It is a country which has 4000
walled cities and countless villages. A
country where locomotion is expensive,
and where the people squeeze money
harder than they do anywhere else in the
world. There is no land on the globe
where cheap transportation would pay bet
ter. The harvest is ripe for the speculator
and the investor, if the fence of Chinese
conservatism and exclusion can be torn
away. Take Peking, with its million and a
half of people. It has not a line of street
cars. Tientsin, eight}' miles away, has a
million of people, and is one of the great
trading centers of the empire. Those who
ride go about in chairs, carried on the
shoulders of men, and all goods are carted
around on wheelbarrows. Tientsin sup
plies Peking with goods, and there is no
railroad between them. It is the same all
over China.
The Chinese are beginning to make their
own cotton. They have a number of large
factories and Li Hung Chang proposes to
build others. In these they have modern
machinery. A great part of the cotton
used is made by hand, not more than one
fifteenth being imported. Our cotton
cloths are more popular than the English
or the native cottons, but they cost too
much, and hence we send but little manu
factured cotton to China. The market,
however, is enormous. One of the Consuls
made an estimate of it not long ago. He
said that the Chinese are clothed princi
pally in cotton. There are at least 400,
--000,000 of them, and they use about 20
yards apiece every year. This would make
a consumption of 8*000,000,000 yards a year.
Take your pencil now and see what'that
means. Eight billion yards are 24,000,000,
--000 feet, or a strip of cotton a yard wide
24,000,000,000 feet long. At 5000 feet
to the mile this would be more than
4.000,000 miles long, or enough to
reach one hundred and sixty times
around the world. One hundred and sixty
feet makes a very wide city street. If you
could have three such streets running clear
around the world, and could patch the
cotton used by the Chinese into one vast
crazy quilt, it would be more than enough
to carpet them. Of this enormous amount
more than seven and a half billion yards
are made by the Chinese, being woven by
the women on hand-looms. If we could
get low freight rates we ought to be able to
supply a large part of these cottons. The
Chinese want a good cotton, and they
need heavy, strong and closely woven
goods for winter. In the future they will
probably make the greater part of their
own goods, but the enormous market
which might be created for our ;aw cotton
is almost inestimable. There would be no
limit to production if we had it, and with
the opening of the Nicaraguan canal the
great part of it ought to come to us. The
kinds of cottons used by the Chinese are
generally blue in color. They use a large
amount of drills, and the sails for their
vessels are made of this cloth.
The Chinese are now using quite a lot of
American lumber. The lumber comes
from Oregon and Washington, and it goes
as far north as Peking. I saw American
pine in the lumber-yards of Japan, and I
met a man who was trying to introduce it
into Eastern Siberia. During ray stay in
Vladivostock an American ship loaded
with California wheat was lying at the
wharves, and quite a good deaf of our flour
is now used in China. Strange as it may
seem to many, rice is an expensive form of
food there, and in the north many of the
people are too poor to eat it. There are no
big flouring-mills in China, and even in
the city of Canton, which, you know, con
tains about 2,000.000 people, I saw oxen
grinding flour by dragging one stone about
on the top of another.
It is impossible to appreciate the for
tunes which are sure to come sooner or
later to some one out of Chinese cheap
labor. I saw a locomotive which they
built at the gun works near Shanghai",
which looked K9 well as any turned out in
our shops, and a Chinese engineer was
operating it. He got about 25 cents a day.
1 saw men making everything under the
sun for wages about a tenth of what the
same class of labor receives in the United
States, and the Englishman in charge told
me that it required only a few months to
make a good mechanic out of an ordinary
Chinaman.
When the Chinese appreciate that they
can manufacture for the world. The coolies
and the men who are now working on the
roads could be put into the factories and
the people will become a' nation of me
chanics and manufacturers. At present
they toil from ten to twelve hours a day
for wages which would hardly support a
dog in this country. I have before me a
list of wages given by Dr. Bedloe when a
Consul at Amoy. here are some of them :
Barbers get $3 a month, boatmen $4. brick
layers $5, masons $6, laundry men $4 and
pavers $4 50 per month. The "plumber is a
rich man in America, but he is glad to re
ceive $6 25 a month in China. Printers re
ceive $9 a month, tanners $6 a month,
telegraph operators $24 a month, ordinary
laborers $4 a month and cigar-makers
about $5 per month. , It is the same all
over the empire and the : wages may be di
vided in half, as they are paid in silver,
which is worth only half the value of our
money. '
J. could fill a page of this newspaper with
the possibilities and the curious features of
labor in China and Japan, and the same
may also. be said of Korea, though there
has been until now so little security for the
fruits of labor that the people have had no
incentive to work. The treaty will bring
a new light- into the hermit nation, and
many of the * old and barbarous customs
will now pass away. For some time there
will, however, be chances for speculative
turns outside of the wonderful resources of
the country. One will be when ' any mem
ber of the royal family dies. •, At this time
the whole nation lis < supposed to go into
mourning. ;; Every man in the country has
to nut on a white ) straw hat as big as an
"i m *u e rl a u and a new gown of yellow grass
c oth. : The man who has a corner on grass
cloth at such times is sure >, to have at least
three million men howling for it. He can
charge his own i prices, and can do almost
as well as Colonel Sellers hoped to do with
his eye-water for the millions of cross-eyed
Chinamen. ; I have ; already x written at
length concerning the gold mines, the coal
mines and the probabilities of there being
large deposits of petroleum in Korea. ■ The
country will now <- be developed,- and there
are good chances in it for American : capi-
FRANK G - <*»««».
THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, MAY 19, 1895.
POTRERO AND MISSION
LIGHTS ON FOLSOM STREET.
Blts of Gossip Gathered Up
From Bright and Busy
Sections.
Napa-Street Hill— Shea's Insanity.
Ambitious Boys— lrving
Institute.
The Southern Heights Improvement
Club is working in a quiet way to perfect a
plan for the removal of the unsightly hill
along Kentucky street at the Potrero. There
are many nlaces around there for which it
would supply filling, such as the Mission
Creek marsh and the mouth of lalais
Creek. A member of the club observed
yesterday:
"The hill will probably never have any
thing done with it until the work on the
Valley roaa is begun. Then it may be
found necessary to use the earth for the
filling in around China Basiu. The City —
that is, the School Department — owns
twelve lots on the south side of the Napa
street line, between Kentucky and Tennes
see streets, and on the other side Messrs.
Davis anu Keis own thirty-two lots that I
know of, and the Reis estate considerable
more. It would probably be an easy mat
ter to get the earth of the hill all the way to
Minnesota street, because that would bring
the property there down to the present
grade, and make it valuable for building
purposes. The most of the property be
yond Minnesota street to Pennsylvania
avenue, and extending from Mariposa
street to Shasta, is owned by the Southern
Pacific, and when that company has de
cided upon its new route to Sierra Point it
will probably use the hill for tilling in the
Mission Creek marsh, which it also owns.
"This would make Napa street a tine
thoroughfare, and reclaim from nature's
inconsiderate topography an immense
stretch of valuable business property. An
electric line would in all likelihood "follow
the easy grade on Napa street to De Haro."
A dredger of the San Francisco
Bridge Company is at work on the channel
just above the Fourth-street drawbridge.
The insane man, David D. Shea, whom
Sergeant Bennet had con lined in the
Potrero station out of regard for the safety
of Father O'Connell of St. Teresa's Church,
has the reputation of being a dangerous
man to be at large. He was arrested five
times at the Potrero between 1886 and 1881.
Since he was let out of the Agnews Asy
lum on probation he made a trip to Boston
and had only recently returned.
Shea has a homicidal mania, which is
aggravated whenever he takes a drink or
two. He keeps a lot of crucifixes, to which
he pays devout respect when deranged.
About twelve years ago he went to South
San Francisco and proceeded to take charge
of the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum.
Two years ago he attacked a sister superior
at St. Dominic's Convent, Bu«h andSteiner
streets. He is a very powerful man. and
at that time gave the police a tierce battle,
He was arrested this last time because of
his most persistent menacing of Father
O'Connell. He said he had given $5 toward
the building ota parochial home, and as
he did not observe any building going up
demanded his money. It ishisdisposition
to resort to violence in the belief that he
is divinely commissioned to renovate the
Catholic church that makes him a terror
to Catholic circles.
His insanity was caused by the hanging
of his son for the murder of a policeman at
Washington, p. C. Shea was then a ser
geant-at-arms in the National Capitol, and
spent all the money he could obtain in his
efforts to save his son from the gallows.
His case has been taken under advisement
by the Insanity Commissioners.
Nine boys are receiving instruction in
mechanical drawing at the Potrero Gram
mar School by Professor R. E. Eldridge,
as competitors for the apprenticeship in
the draughting department of the Union
Iron Works, which School Director Henry
T. Scott is offering as a prize. They are:
Fred Hildebrand, Aug. M» Linehan, Walter
Scharetz, Edward J. Keane, Roscoe G.
Horn, Fred Ricconii, Ferdinand F. Gros
bauer, Ben Hedstrom and David Dickie.
James H. Aver of Kentucky ana Napa
streets has given to the park museum some
specimens of ingenious whittling. Mr.
Aver has a wooden chain which he" carved
out of a single rod of sugar pine. The rod
was \\i inches square, 15)/ feet long and
weighed six pounds when he commenced
and when he finished the chain was 21 feet
long and only weighed two pounds.
The whale fleet steam-tender Jeanie is
about to go on the ways at the Union Iron
Works for an overhauling.
The Golden Shore, one of the Spreckels
sugar fleet, is at the dock of the Western
sugar refinery.
Superintendent Spreckels of the West
ern Sugar Refinery said yesterday that
very little of the cargo of the John G.
North was damaged. He gives Captain
Carlsen and his crew much praise for sav
ing the cargo by vigorous and constant
pumping.
Eureka Valley is rejoicing over the cut
being made on Ridley street, through the
old Spring Valley reservoir at Buena Vista
Park from the. junction of Market and
Dolores streets. There is talk of again
agitating the proposition to extend Market
street from Seventeenth street over the
saddle between the Twin Peaks, and turning
Twin Peaks into a park. Diedrich H.
Wulzen. on Seventeenth and Castro streets,
is said to be the only objector ol any con
sequence.
A. B. Magmre stated yesterday aft
ernoon that the committee, consisting of
Messrs. Somers and Center and himself,
chosen by the Folsom-street Improvement
Club No. 1 to confer with the Electric
Light Company for the lighting of the
bituminized portion of the street, namely,
from Nineteenth street to Twenty-sixth,
was successful. Accordingly "electric
lights will be placed on all the street cross
ings on the portion mentioned. Work of
putting up the poles for the lights will be
gin to-morrow.
Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, at
Market and Sixteenth streets, which has
just been enlarged by the addition of an
other story, will be dedicated to-day,
by Bishop Daniel A. Goodsell at 3 p. m., as
sisted by Bishop Walden. Rev. E. R.
Dille of the Central Methodist Episcopal
Church will preach in the evening. The
Epworth League anniversary will precede
the evening services.
The commencement exercises of Irving
Institute will be held in Trinity Presby
terian Church, corner of Twenty-third and
Capp streets, next Thursday evening, May
23, at 6 o'clock, says the Mission Journal.
Following will be the programme:
Organ prelude, Mrs. H. J. Stewart; chorus
"If Hope Were but a Fairy"; prayer, Rev
J. dimming Smith; piano, "Cachucha
Caprice," Helen L. Ruthrauff; essay, "Lights "
Mabel F. Meany; piano, "Schlu'mmerlied"
Eleanor Dill; essay, "A Schoolgirl's Potpourri,'"
Cornelia I). Lott; piano, Sonati, Andante Opus
26, Chant Polonaise, Ethelwynne Marrack
violin solo. 'Legende," Miriam Hall; essay'
"Gordlan Knots," Fannie M. Agar; songs,
"Slumbar Song" and '•Good-night," Juliet L
Greninger; essay, "To-day and To-morrow,"
Elizabeth Curry; piano, "Valsa Caprice"
Agneb M. Stewart; address, Rev. W. Meany
presentation of diplomas, Rev. Bishop Nichols;
class song, "Alma Mater," class of '95; bene
diction; organ postlude, H. J. Stewart.
Bishop Nichols will present the di
plomas and there will be an address by
Rev. Edward W. Meaney. The graduates
are: Miriam Hall, Estelle M. Davis,
Ethelwynn Marrack, Agnes M. Stewart,
Mabel F. Meaney, Juliet L. Greninger,
Fannie M. Agar, Eleanor Dill, Elizabeth
Curry, Cornelia D. Lott and Helen L.
Ruthrauff.
At the Friday night recital of the
institute, which was a very successful
affair and well attended, the following
took part: Miss Mabel Gale, Miss Aileen
Day, Miss Elizabeth Curry, Miss Anna
Joost, Miss Mabel Barnes, Miss Edith
i fl If I[|| i fey \ : if \ ; \ w (
"THE PICTURE recalls the days when youth, vitality and ambition knew no care,
and gives no hint of what worry, work and application will do to the system. How
many wish they had those days back again! And yet they can if they will but con-
sult their common sense. Everybody knows that the continual use of the body, brain
and nerves leads to waste in each, and that to preserve health and balance the system
a NATURAL AND . EFFICIENT SUSTENANT OR TONIC is needed. What
could be better than the following ?
CELERY For the Nerves and Brain.
BEEF To Build Up and Sustain.
JLJOA/l^ Given in a Pleasant and Natural FormFOP tllB EIOOCL l;
r\R. HENLEY'S CELERY, BEE? and IRON combines these three great Ingredients
'V to health and strength in a way that makes it agreeable to take, and at the same
time tones and builds up the system in a most wonderful manner. The weakest stom-
ach accepts this remedy, and almost immediately SLEEPLESSNESS, NERVOUS-
NESS, HEADACHES, INDIGESTION, KIDNEY, LIVER, STOMACH and BLAD-
DER TROUBLES DISAPPEAR. There is nothing like it as a TONIC, NERVINE
and SYSTEM-BUILDER.
Try it once and you will never be without it.
DR. HENLEY'S
CELERY, BEEF AND IRON
Nature's Builder and Tonic
ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTE*
Mills, Miss Ellie Panno, Miss Addie Stew
art, Miss Mabel Meaney, Miss Edna Smart,
Miss Helen Ruthrauff. Miss Blanche
Southack, Miss Ethel Dalton. Misa Cor
nelia Lott, Miss Juliet Greninger, Miss
Harriet Fisher, Miss Reba Blood, Miss
Miriam Hall and Miss Daisy Waterman.
The orchestra consisted of Misses
Hall and Day, first violins; Misses Smart
and Southack, second violins; Miss Dal
ton, cornet, and Miss Ruthrauff, piano,
under the directorship of Professor A.
Harold Dayton. It gave a selection from
Gounod's "Faust." Misses Fisher. Gale,
Panno, Curry and Blood produced a scene
from Shakespeare's "Henry IV."
The next session of Irving Institute will
begin on Monday, August 5. H. J. Stewart
is the musical director.
Superintendent J. G. Gallagher of sta
tion C postottice has been sick and con
fined to his bed for several weeks. C. W.
Seeley has been stationed at station C
postoffice during his absence.
John Doyle of 2253 Mission street pro
poses to take a trip East. He will spend a
week at Portland first.
Along the Oak-street route of the How
ard-street system, poles have been put up,
and this week wires have been strung with
a view toward changing it to an electric
line. Potrero residents look upon this as
an indication that the old horsecar line
running on Tenth street from Howard,
and along Potrero avenue, will before long
be changed to a first-class electric road, too.
Track-laying of the Sixteenth-street
electric system was about completed on
feolano street yesterday.
A Small Boy's Answer.
At a country school in England it is said
that one of the examiners, in a general ex
ercise, wrote the word "dozen" on the
black board and asked the pupils to each
wn»e a sentence containing the word. He
was somewhat taken aback to find on one
of the papers the following sentence: "I
dozen know my lesson. "-Harper's Round
Table.
Mechanics head the list of inventors.
Clergymen come next.
EFFORT TO KILL A GOAT.
Patrick Murphy Ties Its Legs With the
Remnants of His Shirt and Casts
It Upon the Railroad Track.
A black and white goat of patriarchal
appearance, especially in regard to a lovely
white beard, who has long been a wanderer
in the vicinity of the Fifty- 3econd street
station and who has had the reputation of
conducting himself in a uianner not calcu
lated to raise him in the estimation of his
neighbors belonging to the human family,
had a narrow escape yesterday from being
run over by a freight train, as the result of
an escapade in which he brought down the
wrath of one of the long-suffering natives,
says the Philadelphia Times.
Patrick Murphy, a flagman on the Penn
sylvania railroad, near the Fifty-second
street station, has long been addicted to
the use of red-flannel sbirts, and cherishes
each one with loving care, allowing no one
to wash them but himsalf, and hanging
them out to dry in a sunny spot where he
can watch them dangling in the breeze.
i esterday was a particularly good day for
the drying process, and had it not been for
the arrival of the wandering goat every
thing would have gone to Patrick's satis
faction.
The goat has always had an especial ha
tred for the flaernan on account of his red
visage and his red shirts and Patrick has
not been loath to return the dislike, and
vowed many times that he would ha\-e the
aged wanderer's scalp. Accordinglv,when
the goat appeared upon the hill and began
to tear the fiery garment that hung upon
the line, Patrick sprang to the rescue of
his property, which was nearly demolished
when he reached it.
The sight proved a last straw to Pat's
good nature, and, taking the remainder of
the shirt, he tied the goat's legs and
carried the struggling animal down to the
railroad, where he placed h'm between the
tracks, and left him to return to his post
and watch from a convenient distance the
effect that an outward-bound freight train
would have upon his enemy. Meanwhile
the wanderer lay upon his back kicking
his fettered limbs in the air, and listening
to the noise of the approaching train, the
engineer of which, ever alert for the danger
signal, thought that he saw before him the
customary emblem being waved to warn
him against imminent peril.
The train was moving at a rather more
rapid pace than is usually attained by
those of that species, so that the engineer
had no easy task in bringing it to a halt.
and only did so when about twenty-five
feet from the unsalaried danger signaler
and his flag. Then he sprang from the
engine with the fireman, followed by the
conductor and a little band of bratemen,
all of whom were anxious to learn the
cause of the sudden waving and thankful
for their supposed narrow escape from
death.
Great was their surprise upon getting a
few feet ahead of the engine to see the
danger signal further down, and irv its
place appear an unpicturesque goat wear
ing upon its face an expression of pleasure
such as no goat is ever remembered to have
worn before. A shout went up from the
trainmen when they understood the reason
of their sudden stop, and all hands went
to congratulate the goat, and to tell his
would-be slayer that such a clever animal
should be allowed to live.
♦ — ♦ — •
The Vervain Humming-Bird.
The vervain humming-bird is the small
est bird in existence. It is very little
larger than our familiar bumble-bee. Its
plumage is very brilliant in coloring.
Two specimens are on exhibition in the
National Museum at Washington, and the
tiny balls of bright-colored feathers aver
age about 2% inches in length. The nest
is a frail and almost perfect piece of bird
architecture. It is composed of mosses,
vegetable fiber and wild cotton, with a
delicate lining of spiders' webs. In eather
ing the latter material it is no uncommon
occurrence for the little birds to become
ensnared in the webs of the larger spiders
by which they are killed. The size of the
vervain's nest is three-fourths of an inch
in diameter across the cavity. and siichMv
I more than an inch in total diameter. The
i eggs, always two in number, are pure
; white. They never measure more than
one-third of an inch in length by one-fifth
!of an inch in width. These diminutive
birds are found only in the island of
Jamaica.— Philadelphia Times.
THE ELEPHANT.
The African Species Have Poor Memo*
ries— Descendants of the Mastodon.
The European "elephant herd" is, gen
; erally speaking, the property of the large
i circus owners, and these prefer the Indian
elephant, -which they allege to be more do-
I cile and more reliable . for their purposes
| than : the African species. The trainers
say that the latter have bad memories and
! that this makes them uncertain perform
i ers in the ring. They will learn a few
! tricks without difficulty, but when called
I upon to perform in public they sometimes
I seem to forget their accomplishments and
either stand still or bolt to their stables
| It has been recently pointed out that
i this lack of memory, or perhaps of brain
power, in the African, when compared
with the Indian species, may possibly be
O fr n nt d^ Or deSCent ° the'for-
m ,™ from the mastodon, an earlier extinct
i V. P rfoin a Pi h h m ammot h- The teeth of the
' ♦h.™ « P hant correspond with those of
1 ihon? M todon> whlle in the Indian ele
i Sfnro ™« y * are ana!o * to those of the
1 v™?*^ £* ■■™» ?nioth. When kept in
■ a S -? the African - seems to have less
respect ■ for -humans" ■ than the Asiatic,
and is less , trusted by its keepers, who
seem to look upon it as unsafe. But this
I is only a comparative estimate of a creature
1 d ed w by « side of one which has long
I held the first place among domestic beasts
I of burden. Dr. Sclater, who has summar
ized the general experience of the Zoologi
cal Society for nearly twenty years, gave it
as his opinion that they are quite as intel
ligent as : the : Indian species, though per
haps not equally docile.-The - Saturday
