Newspaper Page Text
THE DONALDSONVILLE CHIEF. VOLUME 1. DONALDSONVILLE, LA., SATURDAY, DECEMBER 2, 1871. NUMBER 12. TonalbsonbiIk QPitef Office in Crescent Plah e. Published Every Saturday iforninq AT-. Donaldsonville, Lt. . -B' LINDEN E. BENTLEI. EDITOR AND PROPRIETOR. TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION One copy, one year . .. .... .$3 00 One copy. six mont hs,..... ....... iingle copies,....................... 0 Payable invariably in advance. AD) VRTISIING RA TES [A square is seven lines Minion type.) Space. I wk. I me. 3 mos.16 mon. 1 yr I square.... $1 $5 *00 $9 2squares... 200 5 9 00 15 00125 00 4 squares... 4 8 15 2500 3500 Scolumn..- 7 13 25 40 00 50 00 Jdolumn.... 14 25 40 6000 70 00 I column... 28 40 55 75 100 Transient advertisements. $1 per square fit insertion; 75 cts. each subsequent inserti Communications may be addxmeieI simspI ' CHIEP, Donaldsonville( La.," sr to the edi tor and proprietor personslly. State Senator Wilbur P. Blakm , of Claiborne, is spoken of as the probi able Democratic candidate for Gove' nor next year. The latest instans of editorial cour tesy is that of uae of our southertt Louisiana contemporaries calling an'= other a " sore-headed lunatjc." No doubt the author of "Write me a letter from home" was expecting iu remittance from the old folks, and wrote that pathetic ballad to remind them of it. Terrebonne calls the present termi nus of its new branch railroad Whist key Point. No doubt a very popular name among the denizens of that par. ish, but we don't admire it. We have received for the first time E a copy of the Louisiana Farmer, pub lished at Arcadia, in this State, but it is so badly printed we are unable to c read it. If the publishers expect us to exchange they must send us reads- t ble numbers of their journal. i . ~ Ce Mr. Daniel Dennett, for twenty-fve years editor of the New Iberia Pltn ters' Banner, has retired from that journal, and it now passes into tt hands of Messrs. W. L. Smylie and A. Dennett, the latter a son of the re}, tiring editor. A Cairo Coroner's Jury brought in a verdict that deceased had " stultified himself with green trash." It seen)s the man had been reading the Demr, cratic papers previous to the recelit elections, and after returns came in the stut' went back on him. The telegraph a few days since brought the heart-rending intelligeni e that the Prince of Wales had passed a sleepless night. Countless thousands await with trembling anxiety to leahn the cause of this fearful catastrophe. Perhaps the Prince was up all night playing "draw poker." We mentioned a couple of week's since that Hon. H. C. Dibble, judge of the Eighth District Court of New Or leans, had entered suit for libel against Mr. J. M. West, publisher of the New Orleans Patriot. The matter having been brought before the Grand Jury, that body found a true bill against the ascused, and an order has been issued for his arrest. We leanm from the Houma Patriot that the Banner, of that town, 'as been suspended for the past three or four weeks, but may soon be iss ed again, as a large lot of Tax Collectdr's advertisements will be ready for pub lication in a short time. When he funny man of the Iberville Pieonee is again driven to desperation for wint of something to write about, and has to get off that "pap sheet" joke of his for the twentieth time, let him m4ke the Banner the objective point of `his witless witticism. And now some Democratic jour als .are pr91agilng the name of Thoma4 A. Scott, tie Delaware railroad autoctat, as an available candidate for the r ext Presidency because he can bring Lrto the contest tye influence of some of th largest ralroad and other coepo rations in the e9u try. We fear Mr. Scott's deas of the way in which this country should be governed are of too narrow gauge to suit a mmjority of the people. But there is no denying he would make a good President-of any railroqn company in the cqq pry Cheek's Exploit. Seventy-five Yen Routed by One-Details of the Attempted Lynching at Brook ville. [From the Cincinnati Gazette. Nov. 21.] A dispatch from Brookville, Indi ana, published in yesterday's Gazette, announced that an attempt was made on Saturday night last to lynch McDonald Cheek, now confined in the jail at that place, for the murder of his father-in-law, Thomas Harrison, I about a year ago. From parties resid o ing near Brookville, who were cog nizant of the facts at the time they occurred, we have obtained the fol lowing particulars, which bear the impress of truth : At about half past twelve o'clock last Sunday morning, a mob com posed of some seventy-five or eighty residents of Aurora and Manchester entered Brookville and proceeded to the jail, for the purpose of hanging McDonald Cheek. They had come in wagons, in two bodies, from differ eat directions, and, by preconcerted arrangement, met in the outskirts of the village, leaving their wagons about a mile out of town, in the tim ber on the west fork of the White water. The persons composing the party were clad in great coats, reach ing the knee and long capes. They were all masked and seemed to be under command of a chief, whose orders were carried one so far as the unforeseen difficulties in the way of their self-imposed mission permitted. On their way to the jail they were encountered by several citizens, who were promptly ordered into their hou ses under penalty of death. To one who met them a short distance from the prison, and demurred to the order, they said : " Go back into your house if you don't want to get shot." And to another who questipned them In regard to their errand: "We don't want to hart anybody here, but we are going to hang Cheek." Arriving at the jail, sledge-hammers and crowbars were produced, and the work of breaking the outer doors commenced. These were three in number, constructed of iron, and withstood the united efforts of the mob for soap twenty minutes before an entrance was forced. As the last door fell, the party formed in military order, and, bifore entering, indulged in a little formality, which, under the circumstances, seems slightly super fluous. The leader, standing at the entrance, repeated the words: "One, two, three, in goes he," and stepped inside, followed by his companions, each one as he entered repeating the cabalistic wel, which, in view of the anexpected termination of the attempt, when it became necessary to reverse the movement and hurriedly execute " out goes he," impart a ludicrous tinge to what was intended to be a tragic retribution. A long ball runs through the jail, upon each side of which are located the cells. Cheek occupied the third one from the outer door, on the right hand side. The cell doers were open, as is the custom, in order to give the prisoners opportunities for exercise in the halls. With the first blow upon the solid outer doors, Cheek roused from his slumber, and knew intuitively that an hour for which he has long looked, had come. Alone, in the darkness of his cell, knowing that there was but little probability of the arrival of aid, he made preparations for defence, determined at least to sell his life as dearly as he could. Wrenching a post from the low bedstead, from which he had but just risen, he took his station neai the door, and awaited the coming struggle. In spite of the awful crime that brought him to a murderer's cell, one cannot repress a sentiment of admiration for the cool ness and courage with which he pre pared to meet what seemed his inevit able doom. The leader of the mob knocked on the door of the first cell, in which was confined a prisoner named Coul ter, on a charge of murder. In an swer to the inquiry " Who's there t " Coulter replied, giving his name. Said the spokesman of the party: " We don't want you, Coulter; we are friends of yours. Where's Cheek?" Coulter, to draw them off the scent, if possible, replied, " Cheek's up stairs, I expect." This answer did not seem to satisfy them. After a word or two among themselves, they proceeded direct to Cheek's cell, knocked at the door which was about half opened and inquired, " Who's here t " Cheek replied, " Harry "--the name of a fellow-prisoner. " Come out and show yourself." He remained motionless. They asked again, "Who's here ? " and he replied as before, " Harry." A member of the party cried, "That's Cheek, now!" One of them, raising the side of a dark lantern, looked within the cell, and seeing the desperate man standing at bay, like a hunted tiger, withdrew with the cry, "He has got a club ! " "Shoot him! shoot him!" yelled several of the mob. " No, no; don't shoot him. Here is a rope--let's hang him," said one who appeared to exercise authority. Said another: " Shoot him, if you can't get him." At this moment Cheek made a movement, and one of the party lunged at him with a crowbar, bruis ing his side, but inflicting no serious injury. Another, who did not believe in incomplete work, drew a navy revel. ver from his breast pocket, and, hand ing it to one of his comrades who was flourishing a small pistol, said: "Here, take my revolver ! Don'l shoot him with that little one; it won't kill him." The man would have been a capital officer of the Paris Commune. The speaker then thrust his weapon inside the door and fired. The muz zle of the revolver pressed against Cheek's side, but at the moment it was discharged he dashed it aside, and the bullet glanced across his knuckles, inflicting a slight wound. The man who had fired, then put his head inside the cell to see if the shot had killed, the prisoner, but as he did so, the bludgeon with which Cheek had armed himself, crushed down upon his unprotected head, and he dropped to the floor like a felled ox. His revol ver fell from his hand, and was at once seized by the prisoner. Ae, they saw the senseless form of their comrade, shd heard the crashing blow, one of their number cried : "My Godl he has killed Snyder, and has got his revolver ! " Then those seventy-five courageous men held an impromptu convention to decide as to the next step to be taken. No-doubt, as they stood there in the ghastly light of the dark lantern, with one of their number lying senseless and apparently dead at their feet, they experienced the peculiar sensa tions so graphically described in the narrative of Bob Acres. After a few moments of irresolute suspense, eyeing the gloomy cell from which came such a deadly check upon their operations, one of the gang standing securely behind the half opened door, pointed his revolver around the corner, but before he could fire, the weapon was stricken from his haud by Cheek, and he subsided. Another consultation was held. Somebody said, , Let us get out of here," and they " got." Picking up the prostrate form of their fallen com Lade, they marched out, each one repeating, as he stepped out of the battered entrance way, "One, two, three, out goes he "-very thankful that, notwithstanding the failure of the enterprise, they had come off with such a slight loss in this well matched encounter between one and seventy five. Cheek with his bed post in one hand, and the captured revolver in the other, harassed the rear of the retreating column out into the jail yard, where he met the Sheriff and a party of citizens, who had been aroused by an alarm from the jailer. When the Sheriff saw them coming out of the building carrying the body of the victim,he hallooed them, think ing they were bearing off his prisoner. The only reply lie received was: " Fire! tire! Shoot the-- !" When the regulators reached the street, and saw the commotion caused by their attempt, they ran In every direction. Several of them lost their way in the timber and corn fields, and were seen by farmers residing in the vicinity, at daylight, with scared faces and soiled garments, not in the least resembhng the reckless and dare-devil sort of fellows they imagined them selves a few hours before. Cheek surrendered himself to the Sheriff with the remark: " John, they ain't got me yet," gave up his trusty bed post and revolver, and went back to his cell. On the way back he said to the Sheriff: "John, get me a horse and a posse, and I will follow them and show where every - of them lives before morning. I don't want you to go into danger, I'll go." When asked afterward, why he did not attempt to escape, he replied: " I am not going away from here until i go free, or on my way to the scaffold. This is three times they have tried to mob me and failed." After daylight the Sheriff went to to the place where the horses of the party had been left, found two or three hitching straps, a halter and a bottle of whiskey. The articles, with the captured revolver, dark lantern, sledge-hammer and a crowbar, are in the Sheriff's hands, and are said to have been identified. While the would-be lynchers were in the jail, several of them removed their masks, and were identified by Cheek as residents of Aurora and: Manchester. The New York Tribuae wittily says: We read wonderful things of the talk ing machine of Prof. Faber, lately exhibted in Philadelphia. You see a highly ornamented table, - and up on it is a lifeless head which pro nounces all the letters and elementary sounds of the English language, with phrases of six and eight words in French, German and English. Sev eral years ago we advocated in these columns the adoption of one or more machines to do the talking in the na tional Congress, and now, just as we were congratulating ourselves upon a device which appeared, at first blush, to meet the case exactly, we are told, to our bitter disappointment, that the Faber contrivance is defective in its sounding of the letter " I." This is fatal (unless it can be improved) to its use by our representatives, who would be nothing if not capable of sounding the personal pronoun in a rotund and f-rtissimo way. As the machine speaks with a fine German accent, it might be found useful on the' stump in Pennsylvania, and we do not see why, for city purposes, it might not be arranged to discourse with a beau tiihl brogue. Large pantaloons threaten to be stylish again. War at Our Own Doors. In addition to the three thousand whisky shops and the thirty thousand men who live off of them ; in addition to the delicate brigade which is too respectable to work and too weak to rob; in addition to the army of men who live off of office or the hope of office, New Orleans is just now called upon to support two stalwart prize fighters and their friends, who have invaded the community because their practices were not endurable in better ordered communities. We pay half a million dollars to support a force organized to suppress disorder, and here we are called upon to foot the extraordinary bill that pays for the fancy living of organized and impu dent disorder itself. If two men fight for a reason on the streets, the police gathers them under its clubs and marches them to the calaboose, because to fight is to disturb society and break the law. And yet two men, capable of earning an honest and reputable living, aware of the expense at which we are placed to prevent lawlessness, boldly enter in our midst, engage whisky shops, flaunt the colors of the prize ring and openly advertise that they intend to violate our laws and spit upon our regulations at a time and place appointed by themselves. Right in the face of the entire police force which costs well on to gight hun dred thousand dollars per annum, these two bruisers publish their in tention to thrash each other, contrary to every principle of decency, in the very face of the law that prohibts such disorder, and in spite of the police that is paid to arrest them. Mace and Coburn represent the very principle that government was framed to combat. In a state of nature two men might attend and take a part, as animals do; but in the social state the privilege of fighting was sur rendered, and penalities were self-im posed upon members for any resump tion of this barbarous and brutal char acteristic. Violence is demoralizing to the community and damaging to the individual. It perverts the mind that is not strong, and it destroys the labor that should be profitably em ployed for the general good. The prize fighter is an eye-sore and an eruption, offensive alike to the sight and to the feeling. He lives upon the industry of others, because he pro duces nothing; he degrades his strength and ability, because it is de grading to descend even lower than brutes, that never fight for wages; he demoralizes humanity, because there are people Who, seeing the blaze of the bruiser's name in print, even fall so low as to envy and to imitate bts example. New Orleans, to-day, is thronged with hundreds of thieves, who are here in attendance on the fight. They are an additional burden upon the community, for since they produce nothing, they must be considered as consumers only. They steal that up on which they live, and they steal it from industry; so that, although it may be said they spend money in the city, it must be considered that they pilfer it from the city. But the worst feature of this entire paceeding is the crop of evils that it leaves behind it..e . get the re proach of the world for tolerating a brutal and disgusting breach of the law. Strong-minded criminals are hardened in their wickedness by the glamor which is thrown around this tolerated erime,and weak-minded and simple folk are taught that there is a species of outlawry that is semi-re spectable. The youth of the city hear their father's discuss the merits of the two law-breakers, and wherever con versation is agitated about this fight, even sensible mea refer to it in lan guage of consideration. The prize ring is thus elevated into a position of recognized respectability by incon siderate citizens, and the rising gen eration accepts the suggestion that there is a class of disorders that it is not degrading to engage in. How, then, are we to obtain peace, if society tolerates acondition of individual war fare such as this that Coburn and his backers hpve declared against Mace and his supporters T-N. 0. Republi can. The Politician of the Period. What an instructive political life is thatof A. O. Hall! First we find him figuring in politics as a Whig. Second, he coquettes with the Know Nothings, and is found parading his " American" sentiments as opposed to persons of -foreign birth and the Catholic faith. Next we find him in the Republican ranks long enough to be elected District Attorney of the county. In this position he cleverly engineers some municipal bills through the State Legislature for the govern ment of this metropolis, under " Com missioners," instead of by popular choice. Subsequent, on or about the time of the capture of New Orleans by the Union forces, the versatile Oakey begins to make wry faces at the Ad ministration of Abraham Lincoln. And when Gen. Butler liberated some slaves (said to belong to a near re lation of the Halls, and which he hoped some day to inherit, should slavery not be abolished), he threw off the mask and went body and boots into the arms of Tammany where he has been liberally rewarded for his treach ery to a party be once professed to serve with idelity. This is the consistent politician, who, as Mayor, would not allow his old supporters, the Orangemen, to parade on the 12th of July, for fear of displeasing his new allies, before whom he parades in a full suit of green d cloth, just as though that garb were d his former red, white, blue and black. And now A. O. Hall, appoints almost all our city officers including members of the Educational Board of School Trustees of the several wards--many f of them for a term of years more than d double that of his official existence (unless in the meantime he shah be re elected, which, from present indica r tions, is by no means likely). Who will say, with these facts before him, if that the Democratic partyis not a par e ty of principle, and that Oakey Hall, its great high priest, is not the chief e among ten thousand. Curiosities of Memory, John Kemble used to say that he could learn a whole number of the Morning Post in four days; and Gen eral Christie made a similar assertion : c but it is not known how far either of them verified their statement. Rob ert Dillon could repeat in the morn ing six columns of a newspaper he had read over night. During the Repeal debates in the House of Com mons, thirty-seven years ago, one of the members wrote out his speech, sent it to the newspapers and repeated it to the House in the evening. It was found to be the same verbatim as that which he had written out. John Fuller, a land agent in Norfolk, could remember every word of a sermon, and write it out correctly after going home. This was tested by comparing his written account with the clergy man's manuscript. Sealiger could re peat a hundred verses or more, after having read them a single time. Sen eca could repeat two thousand words on hearing them. Magliabeechia, who had a prodigious memory, was i once put to a severe task. A gentle man lent him a manuscript which was read and returned. The owner, some time afterward, pretending he had lost it, begged Magliabecchia to write out as much as he could remember; whereupon the latter, appealing to his memory, wrote out the whole essay. Cyrus, if some of the old his torians are to be credited, could re member the name of every soldier in his immense army. There was a Corsican boy who could rehearse forty thousand words, whether sense -or nonsense, as they were dictated, and then repeat them on the reversed order, without making a single mis take. A physician of Massachusetts, about a half a century ago, could repeat the whole of " Paradise Lost" without mistake, although he had not read it for twenty years. Euler, the t great mathematician, when he-became blind, could say the whole of Virgil's " Eneid," and could remember the first line and last line on every page of the particular edition which he had been accustomed to read before he became blind. One kind of retentive memory may be considered as the result of sheer hard work, a determination toward one particular achievement, without reference either to cultivation or to memory on other subjects. This is frequently shown by persons in hum ble life in regard to the bible. An 'i old beggarman at Stirling, known o some forty years ago as Blind Aleck, afforded an instance of this. He knew the whole of the bible by heart; i insomuch that, if a sentence were read to' him, he could name book, chapter and verse; or, if the book, chapter and verse were named, he could give the exact words. A gen- t tleman to test him, repeated a verse, purposely making one verbal inaccur acy; Aleck hesitated, named the place where the passage is to be found, but at the same time pointed out the error. The same gentleman asked him to repeat the ninetieth v' verse of the seventh chapter of the book of Numbers. Aleck almost in stantly replied: "There is no such II verse; that chapter has only eighty- is mine verses." sa A man of seventy years, living near Newport, Ind., quarreled with his wife, and taking down his shot gun, annunced that he would commit suicide forthwith. He went into the yard, lay down on the ground where he could be seen from a frontg window, fired the gun off in the air, and re mained motionless for an hour, during which time he slyly watched the door and window for the appearance of his grief-striken wife. " But he was sad ly mistaken," says the old gentleman's home paper. "They did not come out to see whether he had blown the top of his head off or not. This was more than the old man could stand; he rose up, went into the house, and made things hot for the old woman and the childrep for a while. He'd show them wh Jther they wouldn't come out when he had killed himself." Old Rowe keeps a hotel in the northern part of this State, which he boasted was the best in them parts, where, as he used to any, that you could get everything that was made to eat. One day, in conmes a Yankee, sends his horse round to the stable snd stepping up to the bar asked old Rowe what he could give him for dinner. "Anything from an elephant to a canary bird's tongue." " Wa'l," said the Yankee, eyeing old Rowe, "I guess I'11 take a piece of pickled elephant." Out bustled old Rowe into the dining-room, leaving the Yankee nonplussed at his gravity. Presently he came back again. "Well, sir, we've got 'em all right, right here in the house, but you'll have to take ia whole one, 'cause we never cut 'em." The Yankee thought he wou.4 take some codfish and potatoes. The Besttsthte of Paris. The municipal authorities of the French metropolis are most energetic in their efforts to restore Paris in some measure to its former splendor. An army of twenty-five thousand ma sons is at work under the direction of competent architects, and the hope may be now entertained that the un rivaled city on the Seine will rise like a Phoenix from its ashes at a not too distant period. Recent files of Paris papers, giving many details on the subject, estimate the time when the work of restoration will be finished at about three years, although many of the magnificent edifices destroyed by the vandals of the Commune present already quite a respectable appear ance, which remninds the beholder in some measure of the days of their glory. Many of the old works of art, that were deemed lost forever, have since been found intact under the cin ders, and it is a good proof of the so lidity of the building materials used that a great many of the old and blackened walls have been found still solid and fit for use. If Paris had been built like Chicago, not a stone would have been left standing, and the loss of life would have been fearful. As it was, the solid walls kept the fire flood in proper bounds, and thus prevented a disaster in comparison to which the burning of Chicago would have been a mere bonfire. The two most magnifleent edifices that were destroyed by the insurgents, the Hotel de Ville and the Tuileries, are in a fair way of restoration. It had at first been the intention to re build only the most ancient part of the former, without the magnificent wings added by Louis Philippe, but this plan was abandoned, and it is to be restored as it was previous to the in surrection. All of the pieces of the maid reliefs that adorned this magnifi cent structure have fortunately been found, and will be completely restored. The bronze statues were also discov ered almost uninjured among the cin ders, so that we may soon see the old city building in its former shape. -The Tuileries, however, are to be much reduced in size, as it would prove too expensive to restore the building to its original state. Never theless, the new structure will be very fine, and the plan is said to be taste~ ful and elegant. But an irreparable loss to Paris is the fearful devastation in the garden of the Tuileries. Dar ing the siege it was used as an artil lery camp, and the bad usage it re ceived as such was mournfally main tained by the Communists, who took only pleasure in ruining it altogether. The Vendcme pillar is umlergeing a complete process of reconstruction. Its completion is, however, prevented by a singular fact. All the pieceshave been found except those reliefs that represented the victories of Napoleon over Prussiaiin 1808. These are known to be in the hands of foreign parties, who ask exorbitant prices for the same. The same can be said of the Arch of Triumph. Only the sculptures of this splendid archway have been much injured by missiles, and M.Etex,their original maker, is at present engaged in restoring them.. The Louvre, the palaces of the min istries, the splendid palace of the Le gion of Honor, and the Avenue de l'Imperatrice have been almost com pletely restored, but the other public buildings are still being demolished. A good sign for Paris is in the fact that a great many of the private build ings devastated by the fire were still found to have solid walls, so that only internal restoration has been found necessary, which will materially has ten the rebuilding of the city.-Louis iville Courier-Jomral. Ox SPRINGING OUT or BED.-Dr. Halldoes not approve of the old-fash ioned doctrine which was formerly in stilled into the minds of children that they should spring out of bed the instant they awoke in the morning. He says that "up to eighteep years every child should be ailoiwa ten hours sleep, but time should be allowed to rest in bed, after the sleep is over, until they feel as if they had rather get up than not. It is a very great and mischievous mistake for persons, old or young-especially children and feeble or sedentary persons-to be come out of bed the moment they wake up; all our instincts shrink from it, and fiercely kick against it. Fifteen or twenty minutes spent in gradually waking up, after the eyes are opened, and in turning over and stretching the limbs, do as muc& good as sound sleep, becaunse these oper ations set the blood in motion by de grees, tending to equalize the circula. tion ; for during sleep the blood tends to stagnation the heart beats feebly and slow, and to shock the system by bouncing up in qn instant and send ing the blood in overwhelming quan tities to the heart, causing it to as same a gallop, when the instant be fore it was in a creep, is the greatest absurdity. This instantanebus boun cing out of the bed as soon as the eyes are open will be followed by weariness long before non." A young lepublcan candidate for office, in Gseene county, New York, took his defeat oo much to heart that he went on-a drunken debauch to drown his sorrow, and died in a week. Before his nomination he had never tasted a drop of liquor. A Misouuri paper has publshed the names of the,phy lsian Whbo have had bud luck with their pasate.