Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume], February 23, 1899, Image 4

About Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925

Image provided by: Wisconsin Historical Society

                
WOMAN IN THE HOME
TALMAGE PREACHES ON TRIALS
L OF WIVES AND MOTHERS
i
REWARDS OF THE HUMBLE
Lessons From the Story of Mary and
Martha —Annoyances of Home Life
Often Steps to High Reward.
Beautiful Picture of the Master’s
Visit.
' This discourse of Dr. Talmage seems
to open all the doors 6f home life and
rouses appreciation of work not or
dinarily recognized; text, Luke 10:40:
“Lord, dost thou not cure that my sis
ter hath left me to serve alone? Bid
her therefore that she help me.”
Yonder is a beautiful village home
stead. The man of the house is dead
and his widow has charge of the prem
ises. It is Widow Martha, of Bethany.
Yes, I will show you also the pet of the
household. It is Mary, the younger sis
ter, with a book under her arm, and in
her face no sign of care or anxiety
about anything. Company has come.
Christ appearing at the outside of the
door makes some excitement inside the
door. The sister set back the disar
ranged furniture, arrange their hair
and in a flash prepare to open the door.
They do not keep Christ waiting out
side until they have newly appareled
themselves or elaborately arranged
their tresses, and theu with affected
surprise come otil and pretend not to
have heard tlie two or three previous
knockings say: "Why, is that, you?”
No, they were ladies and always pre
sentable, although, perhaps, they had
not on their best. None of us always
have on our best. Otherwise very soon
our best would not be worth having on.
They throw open the door and greet
Christ. They say: “Good morning,
Master. Come in and be seated.”
Christ brought a company of friends
with Ilim, and* the influx of so many
■xcity visitors, you do not wonder, threw
ithe country home into some perturba
tion. I suppose the walk from the city
had been a keen appetizer. The kitch
en department that day was a very im
portant department, and I think as
soon as Martha had greeted her guests
she went to that room. Mary had no
anxiety übout the dinner. She had
full confidence that her sister Martha
could get up the best dinner in Bethany,
and she practically said: “Now, let ns
have a division of labor. Martha, you
cook, and I’ll sit down mm learn.”
The same difference you now some
times see between sisters. There is
Martha, industrious, painstaking, a
good manager, ever inventive of some
neW' pastry, discovering something in
household affairs. Here is Mary, fond
of conversation, literary, so full of
questions of ethics she has no time to
discuss questions of household welfare.
It is noon. Mary is in the parlor.
Martha is in the kitchen. It would have
been better for them to have divided the
toll, and then they could have divided
the opportunity of listening to Christ.
But Mury monopolizes Christ while
Martha swelters before the tire. It was
very important that they have a good
dinner that day, for Christ was hungry,
and He did not often have luxurious en-
tertolnment. Alas. me! if ail the re
sponsibllity of that entertainment had
rested with Mary. what a repast they
would have had! Mut somethiagwent
in the kitchen, Kither the tire
would not burn, or the bread would not
bake, or something was turned black
that ought to have been only turned
brown, or Martha scolded herself an,d
forgetting all the proprieties of the oc
casibn, with In sweated brow she rushed
out of the kitchen into the parlor, per
haps with loop's in one hard and
piteher in the other, and she cried out:
“Lord, dost thou not care that my sis
ter ffs left me to serve nlotlt ? Mid her
therefore that she help me.” Christ
setddcri lint a word If it w* re-n % nhlin<r
i ruttu-r have Mini scold me than
Sybody else hies-- me. There was
T thing acerb in Hie Saviour’s reply.
He knew that Martha hud been working
herself almost to death to get Him
something to eat. and lie appreciated
[her kindness, and lie practically said:
| “My dear woman, do not worry. Let
the dinner go. Sit down here on this
touch beside you£ younger sister Murv.
let us talk about something else.
Martha. Martha, thou art careful and
troubled about many things, but one
thing is needful."
As Martini thrown open the door 1
look in to-day. nml 1 s .*e a great many
household anxieties, and about them
1 1 uni going to speak of the Ixird of
Mary and Martha and will help
i me by His grace.
As 1 look into that door, in the tlrst
place, f seethe trial of nonappreeiation.
That was what made Martha so vexed
at Mary. Mary . the you litre r sister, had
no proper estimate of the elder sister's
fatigue. just as now men having annoy -
ances of store and factory and shop or
at the stock exchange come home at
night and hear of some household an
noyance. and they say: “Oh. that's
r nothing! You ought to be in a factory
(a day and have ten or fifteen or twenty
or one hundred subordinates. Then you
would know something about annoy -
ante and trouble.” Oh, man, let me tell
you that a wife and a mother has to
conduct at the same time a university,
f a clothing establishment, n restaurant,
Ia laundry, a library, and has to be
| health officer, police and president of the
whole realm; She has to doa thousand
j, things, and to do them well, in order to
|niuke things go smoothly, and that is
filial pills the awful lux on a woman's
uer'cs and a woman's brain. I know |
t,here ure exceptions to the rule. Some-
Hues you will find a woman who can
4r Mown in l,t-c..iraehttir the library [
toull day w iUiouV any anxiety, or tarrv on k
the belated pillow, and all the cares of <
the household are thrown upon serv-J
ants who have large wages and great
experience, but that is the exception.
I speak of the great masses of house
keepers, to whom life is a struggle, and
who at 30 years of age look as though
they were 40. The fallen at Chalons
and Austerlitz and Getty sburg and Wa
terloo are a small number in compar
ison with those who have gone down
under the Armageddon of the kitchen.
Go out to the country and look over
the epitaphs on the tombstones. They
are all beautiful and poetic, but if the
tombstones could tell the truth thou
sands of them would say: "Here lies
a woman v\ ho was killed by too much
mending and sewing and baking and
scouring and scrubbing,”and the weap
on with which she was killed was a
broom or a sewing machine or a ladle.
The housewife rises in the morning
half rested. At an irrevocable hour she
must have the morning repast ready.
What if the fire will not burn? What
if tlie clock stop? What if the mar
keting has not been sent in? No mat
ter that; it must be ready at the ir
revocable hour. Then the children
must be got ready for school. But what
if the garments be torn? What if they
do not know their lessons? What if
the hat or sash is lost? They roust
be ready. Then you have the duty of
the day or perhaps several days to plan
out. But what if the butcher sends
meat unmasticable? What if the gro
cer furnishes you articles of food adul
terated? What if the piece of silver be
lost, or a favorite chalice be broken,
or the roof leak, or the plumbing fail,
or any one of a thousand things oc
cur? No matter. Everything must be
ready. The spring is coming, aud there
must be revolution in the family ward
robe, or the autumn is at hand, and you
must shut out the northern blast. But
how if the moth has preceded you to
the chest? How if the garments of the
last year do not fit the children now?
What if all the fashions have changed?
The house must be an extempoiized
apothecary’sshopordispensary. There
must be relief for all sty les of ailments
—something to loosen the croup, some
thing to cool the burn, something to
poultice the inflammation, something
to silence the jumping tooth, some
thing to soothe the earache. O man of
business, if you had as many cares as
that you would be a tit candidate for
an insane asylum! If Martha make un
der such circumstances an impatient
rush on the library or the drawing
room. be putieut s be lenient. Oh. my
sister, though my words may not
arouse in many souls any appreciation
of your toil, let me assure you from the
kindliness w ith which Jesus Christ met
Martha that lie appreciates all your
trials from garret to cellar, and the God
of Deborah and Miriam and Abigail is
ihe (Lhl of the housekeepers! Christ
never married, that lie might be the
especial friend aud confidant of a whole
world of troubled womanhood. 1 blun
dered. Christ was married. The Ilible
says the church is “the Bride, the
Lamb’s wife." and that makes me know
that a woman has a right to go to
Christ njjth all her annoyances ami per
plexities and fatigues, for by his oath
of conjugal fidelity He hath sworn to
sympathize. George Herbert put the
thought in three or four verses, quaint
and peculiar, but strong, and in one
verse saying:
Thy servant by tills clause makes drudgery
divine;
Who sweeps a room as for thy laws makes
this and the action fine.
A young woman of brilliant educa
tion ami prosperous surroundings was
called downstairs to help in I lie üb
sence of the servants ami there was a
ring at the bell, and she went to the
door, and an admirer entered. lie suid:
“I thought I heard music in the house.
Was it on the piano or the harp?” She
said: "Neither; it was a frying pan
accompaniment to a gridiron! In
other words, i was called downstairs
to help. 1 suppose some time I shall
have to learn, and 1 have begun now.”
When will the world learn that every
kind of work that is right is honor
able?
Bu* oh, the joy for the weary feet
when they step into the celestial equip
age. and, oh, the joy of those to whom
home was a martyrdom on earth when
they go into that home where they will
never have to do anything that they do
not want to do! What a change from
the time she put down the rolling pin.
to the time she took up the scepter!
If Chalsworth park and the Vanderbilt
mansion were lifted into the Celestial
City, they would be looked at as unin
habitable rookeries, ami Lazarus him
self would be ashamed to be seen going
In or out of them, ao great are the pal
aces awaiting nil God’s dear children,
and so much grander the Heavenly
architecture than the earthly. It is
often not only the toil of the house
keeping, but it is the sickness and the
sorrow that go along. It is a simple
fact that one-half of the women of the
land are invalids. The mountain lass
who has never had an ache nor a pain
may consider household work of no
very great weariness, and at the even
tide may skip out to the fields and
drive the cattle home, and until ten
o'clock at night may till the cabin with
laughing racket, but, oh. to do the hard
work of the household with a shattered
constitution after six weeks' whoop
ing cough has raged in the household,
making the nights ns sleepless as the
days, then it is not so easy. And then
this work of the house has often lobe
undertaken when the nerves are shat
tered with some bereavement that has
put desolation in every room of the
house and scut the crib into the garret
because its occupant has been hushed
into a slumber that needs no mother’s
lullaby. Oh. it was n great deal easier
for her to brood the whole Hock than
to brood a part of them, now that the
rest have gone! You may tell her that
her departed children are in the bosom
of a loving God. but. motherlike, she
will brood both Hoyjvs. putting one
VSk ing of cafe over the flock in the house.
[pitUing the other wing of care over
the* flock in the grave. Nothing but the
old-fashioned religion of Jesus Christ
can take a woman happily through
home trials.* All these modern reli
gions amount to nothing. They do nov
help. They do not comfort when there
is a dead babe in the bouse. Away
with them and give us the old-fashioned
religion of Jesu*, Christ, that has com
forted so ninny in the days of sorrow
and trouble!
Romance and novelty may for a little
while seem to be a substitute. The
marriage day has only gone by. just
gone by, and all household cares art
atoned for by the joy of being together
and by the fact that when it is late ul
night it is not necessary to discuss
whether it is time to go. .Til the mis
haps of the newly-married couple in the
way of household affairs are not mat
ters of anxiety or reprehension, but
merriment. The loaf of bread turned
into a geological specimen, the slushy
custard and jaundiced and measly bis
cuits! Oh, it is a very bright sunlight
that falls upon the cutlery and mantel
ornaments of anew home! Romance
and novelty will do for a little while,
but after awhile the romance is all
gone, and there is a loaf to be made, a
loaf that cannot be sweetened by any
earthly condiments, and cannot be
flavored with any earthly flavors, and
cannot be baked in any ordinary oven.
It is the loaf of domestic happiness
All the ingredients from Heaven. Fruit
from the tree of life and sweetened
with the new wine of the kingdom and
baked in the oven of home trial. God
only can make that loaf. You can cut
it, but it takes God to make it.
Solomon wrote out of his own misera
ble experience—he had a wretched
home; no niamcan be happy with two
wives, much less with 700, and out of
his wretched experience he wrote:
“Better is a dinner of herbs where love
is than a stalled ox and hatred there
with.” Oh, the responsibilities of
housekeepers! Kings by their indiges
tion have lost empires, and generals
through indigestion hive lost battles.
One of the great statisticians says that
out of 1,000 unmarried men 30 were
criminals, and out of 1,000 married men
only 18 were criminals, showing the
power of home. And, oh, the respon
sibility resting upon housekeepers! Bj
the food they provide, by the couch
they spread, by the books they intro
duee, by the influence they bring
around the home, they are helping to
decide the physical, the intellectual
the moral, the eternal, welfare of the
human race. Oh, the responsibility!
That woman sits in the house of God
to-day perhaps entirely unappreciated.
She is the banker of her home, th _• presi
dent, the cashier, the teller, the dis
count clerk, and ever and anon there is
a panic. God knows tlie anxieties and
the care, and He knows that ibis is no:
a useless sermon, but that there are
multitudes of hearts waiting for Ihe
distillation of the Divine mercy and
solace in their hour of trials and their
home duties and their own fatigues
The world hears nothing about them.
They never spenk about them. You
could not with the agonies of an in
quisition bring the truth out of them
They keep it still. They sny nothing.
They endure and will until God nnd the
judgment right their wrongs. “Oh,”
says some sister, "are you not trying to
show that all a woman's life at home is
one of self-sacrifice?” Yes. my sister,
and that is the only kind of life worth
living. That has been the life of Flor
ence Nightingale; that was the life of
Edward I’ayson; that was the life of
the Lord Jesus Christ; that is the life
of every man or woman that is happy—
a life of self-sacrifice. Those people
living for themselves—are they happy’
Find me one. 1 >ll give you all the na
tions of the earti. to find me one. Not
happy—no, not happy. It is the self
sacrificing people that are happy, for
God pays so largely, so gloriously, so
mngnificiently, in the deep and eternal
satisfactions of the soul. Self-sacrifice!
We all admire it in others. llow little
we exercise of it! How much would we
endure—how much would we risk —for
others?
Avery rough schoolmaster had a
poor lad that had offended the laws ot
the school, and he ordered him to eome
up. "Now,” he said, "you take off your
coat instantly nnd receive this whip!"
The boy declined, and more vehemently
the teacher said: “I tell you, now, take
off your coat—take it off instantly!"
The boy again declined. It was not be
cause he was afraid of the lash—he was
used to that in his cruel home—but it
was for shame. lie had no undergar
ments. and when at last he removed
his. coat there went up a sob of emotion
all through the school as they saw why
he did not wish to remove his coat nnd
as they saw the shoulder blades almost
cutting through the skin. As the
schoolmaster lifted his whip to strike
u resolute, healthy boy leaped up and
said: “Stop, schoolmaster; whip me!
He Is only a poor chap; he can't stand
it: whip me!" "Oh.” said the teacher
"it’s going to lie a very severe scourg
ing! But if you want to tnkc the posi
tion of a substitute you can do it.” The
Ih>\ said: "I don’t care. Whip me.
I'll take He’s only a poor chap
Don't you see the bones almost eome
through the Hesli? Whip me." And
when the blows came down on the boy's
shoulders this healthy, robust lad made
no outcry. He endured it all uncom
plaining'..;. We all say "Bravo!" for
that lad. Bravo! That is the spirit of
(hrist! Splendid! How much scourg
ing. how much chastisement, how much
anguish, w ill you nnd I take for others?
Oh. that we might have something of
that boy’s spirit! Aye. that we might
have something of the spirit of Jesus
Christ, for in all our ocupations aud
trades and businesses, and all our life,
home life, foreign life, we are to re
member that the sacrifice for others
will soon be over.
Walter Luther of Poughkeepsie, N.
Y.. died suddenly at Joliet. 111.
MUSTACHE AND CHARACTER.
Dispute about the Kaiser's Beard —Its
Cultural Mission.
A German-Amerlean asks what the
German phrase “sich streiten um das
Kaiser’s Bart,” which his dlctioqfery
tell3 him means "to dispute about tri
fles,” really means and how it origi
nated. Its literal translation would
be “to quarrel about the emperor’s
beard,” a proverbial expression which
is said to have grown out of a famous
litigation about the rights claimed by
the Convent of St. Maximin, near Trier
(Treves), in Germany, on the ground
of a document issued by Karl der
Crosse (Charles the Great) in 1779, by
which this Kaiser granted certain
lands and privileges to the monks of
that monastery. In this deed Charle
magne, as the French call aim, ap
peal's beardless upon the seal attached
to it. This fact formed the basis for
a suit entered against the Brothers of
St. Maximin by the claimants, who
charged the monks witn fraud and im
pugned the genuineness and validity
of the imperial deed, on the ground
that the great kaiser had invariably
been represented bearded upon the
seals of sisailar documents. Thence
arose a long dispute about the kaiser’s
beard, which, to our knowledge, has
never been decided, although it has
since been proven that several of the
old Frankish kings and predecessors
of Karl der Grosse, whose people gave
to the French both their name and
their German fashion of wearing
beards, alternately appear either with
or without beard upon the royal seals
and coins. The dispute about the
kaiser’s beard was therefore not exact
ly a quarrel about trifles, and in the
light of this historical explanation we
submit the following observations:
That among tue physiognomic types
for character-reading whiskers play .in
important part has never been denied.
We do not know whether pogonology
or geneiology has ever been treated as
an integral part of any philosophical
system, although Jacques Antoine Du
laure, in 1786, published a book en
titled Pogonologie ou Histoire Philo
sophique de la Barbe. From the lit
erature of the beard, as a German en
cyclopedia designates it, it may be seen
that both French and German writers
on the subject of the cultural history
of this hirsute appendage of man lay
stress on the fact that its shape and
fashion are indicative of racial, nation
al and individual characteristics. Of
this M. Philippe, in his Histore de la
Barbe, and Falcke, in his Haar und
Bart der Deutsehen, have furnished
sufficient proof. Oriental and classical
mythology and art, likewise, afford ev
idence of the same theory. A recent
writer even asserts that it is possible
to discover the chief characteristics
of a man from the shape, color and
texture of his moustache. The Ger
man kaiser’s upper lip adornment
seems to have inspired his supposition,
which he sets forth in the London
Daily Mail.
Take, for instance, he says, the Ger
man emperor. Note how his mus
taches grow straight along the lip to
the corners of the mouth, the ends
then turning upward in a sharp curve.
This style undoubtedly indicates ra
pidity of thought and decision, and if
ever a man could be judged by his
mustache it is his majesty. Next comes
the czar of Russia, and the first thing
noticeable is the fine, full, natural curl
of his mustache. Its similarity to
that of the duke of York is moot strik
ing. Ther is a regular, even growth,
with a direct line of hair from the
nostril to the end of the lip, and this
shows that ambition tempered n/ a
thoroughly even mind is the principal
trait in each character. And thus the
writer goes on to give the mustache
mind rearding of Balfour, Cecil Rhodes
and of other noted men, to arrive fit
the conclusion that whether light or
heavy, long or short, each and every
mustache is thoroughly indicative of
the leading traits of character pos
sessed by Us owner.
Among the numerous anecdotes told
in Berlin of the visit of the imperial
couple to Jerusalem is one In connec
tion with their inspection of the Ger
man female orphanage at the holy
city. The girls sang, as a greeting,
“Dem Kaiser gilt mein erstes Lied”
(My first song 43 for the emperor).
When the words "Der Kaiser lebe
hoch!" (long live the emperor) came,
William 11, to amuse the children took
a step backward.as if startled. The
little singers laughed. The empress
jokingly asked them, "Well, did you
see the kaiser? Which is he?” some of
the children cried, “The one with the
star," but a little Armenian girl said
pointing to the emperor’s turned-up
mustache. "The one with the hair so
on his cheek,” representing at the
same time by her two index fingers
the well known shape of the emperor’s
mustache ends. “Yes, that’s he,” the
empress replied, laughing. Then the
kaiserin led a little girl up to her con
sort, and said, “Look, Wilhelm, this
girl is from German east Africa.”
"Your majesty's rightful subject,” re
marked one of the officers of the insti
tution. “Yes, it is true; this is my
only yellow German here.” answered
the kateer, and took the little one up
in his arms.
CLEVER LITTLE STORIES.
According to the Sioux City Journal,
a person who has just returned to
'lowa from Chicago tells an amusing
theater Incident which happened there
He says: "At all the large theaters in
Chicago is a man to call the numtier
of the carriages for the patrons as they
come out. At one of th*‘se places the
caller was having more business than
a cranberry merchant when a man
came from the gallery exit, and, seeing
all the swells asking for their car
riages, he thought he would be in the
£Wim. So, stepping up to the caller,
fie pompously said: ‘<iall 6,540.’ Loud
ly the man in liver^'shouted: ‘Sixty
fixe-forty!’ and repeated the call. Just
.as he was about to give up in despair
a street car clattered along bearing m
Its ijft iq large figures 6,540. The gal
lery .s&u pointed to the number and
climber aboard, shaking hands with
himself on the good joke’ he had on
the caller.”
Speaker Reed, when told last sum
mer that Congressman Dingley was
v*ry fond of Mark Twain and the
American humorists generally, made
answer: "Why, when Diugley was a
young fellow he preferred sitting up
nights read.ng the latest treasury re
port to holding a pretty girl on his
knee. Isn’t that so, Dingley?” “Well,”
replied the author of the tariff bill,
“I leave that to Mrs. Dingley.”
A Yankee and an Irishman, happen
ing to be riding together, passed a gal
lows. “Where would you be,” said
Jonathan, “If the gallows had its due?”
“Riding alone, I guess,” said the Irish
man."
“The government have alleviated the
confidence of the country,” shouted a
public orator, who 'had intended to say
the exact opposite. When hi3 support
ers cried at him he recognized his
error. “Gentlemen, I should have said
alenieated,” he continued, amid the
jeers of his listeners.
AIRSHIP FOR WAR DEPARTMENT.
Government’s Practical Encourage
ment to Prof. Langley.
The war dapertment’s recent appro
priation to Prof. Langley for the con
struction of a man-carrying airship
for military purposes has reminded
many interested persons of the scores
of extravagant schemes which have
been hatched out by heat of the boil
ing Yankee brain since gossip first
learned that our military authorities
yearned for an aerial as well as a ma
rine navy. The notion has been well
nigh univei'sal among latter-day fly
ing machine enthusiasts first
airship to be launched for practical
purposes would be a vessel of war, but
these genuises have disagreed as to
whether the pioneer aerial war ship
should be based upon the principle of
the purely mechanical aerodrome of
the dirigible elongated balloon, of the
captive kite, of the rocket or of the
soaring apparatus. During practically
every congress of recent years some
good-natured legislator has been
teased into introducing a bill appro
priating money for a flying machine of
some sort .but needless is it to state
that no such bill has ever made en
couraging progress along the congres
sional gauntlet.
The decision of the war department
authorities to perfect the mechanical
aerodrome was not reached without
considerable controversy as to the
relative merits of this principle and
those of the dirigible baloon being
industriously experimented necessarily
accentuates Yankee originality and
ambition to show the world more of
our ability to walk as victors in paths
unbeaten. The baloon will doubtless
remain as a valuable accessory to our
sjgnal corps, but it has long been rec
ognized that, although an important
vehicle of defense in some emergen
cies, and an all-seeing factor in aerial
espionage, it is, nevertheless, in con
tinual peril, presenting a conspicuous
target to the enemy and moving but
slowly across the heavens. The first
use of an aerodrome would not be to
take part in actual battle, perhaps,
so much as to serve as a vehicle of
communication. One might be guided
over hostile territory, upon which it
might drop high explosives, destroy
ing fortifications, arsenals, vessels of
war, bridges or other means of com
munication. A machine based upon
Prof. Langley’s aerodrome would be
very much less likely to be hit by a
gun aimed from the earth than would
a balloon, on account of its much
smaller size, combined with its ex
treme speed, which some aerodyna
mists prophesy will one day reach as
much as 200 miles an hour. Owing to
the small area exposed by the light
frame and vital parts, it will be very
difficult to hit, and If struck the
chances are that a projectile would
pass through one of the thin cover
ings of the wings without shattering
any other part. It is believed that an
aerodrome will carry guns heavier
than a Maxim repeater, which weighs
about 60 or 70 pounds.—Washington
Correspondent of the Globe-Democrat.
A SELF-PROPELLING BOAT.
In the Christmas number of Pear
son's some interesting particlars are
furnished by Herbert C. Fyfe of a craft
that propels itself, and to which the
inventor, Mr. Linden of the zoologi
cal station at Naples, has given the
designation cf the Autonaut. Witu
out the help of engines, or steam, or
electricity, or “man power,” this curi
o’d vessel makes headway against
wind and wave at a speed, it seems, of
from three to four miles an hour.
Singularly enough, too, the rougher
the sea the faster she moves —the ex
planation being that she is propelled
by the action of the waves. The se
cret of her propulsion lies in a couple
of pieces of apparatus, not unlike
gridirons, fixed, one at ♦he bow and
the other at the stern, about level
with the keel. These strips of steel
are what the ingenious inventor cans
"feathering fins;” and it Is stated that
he was led to his discovery by closely j
observing the motion of fishes’ fins, j
especially the dolphin’s tail. In the I
case of the Autonaut these so-called
"fins" are moved by the waves in one
direction, and rebound back of their
own elasticity. Hence, it is explaned
no angles are required to propei
strange craft.—London Telegraph.
WORLD’S BIGGEST CAR FERRY.
How Freight is Carried Across Lake
Michigan the Year Round. ,
It Is highly probale that thereftS no
town in' the United States of less
pretension than Ludington, a city of
8,000 or 9,000 inhabitants that is well
out over several square miles
at the point where the
Hotepseakam river joins Lake Michi
gan.
Certainly there is no town along the
western shore of the southern penin
sula of Michigan where the dweller in
a seaboard city would be more sur
prised by anything strongly remind
ing him of the shipping to be seen in
a great Atlantic port. Yet not a day
passes that the inhabitants of Lud
ington do not see the arrival of what
closely resembles an ocean going
steamer of such size and would fc<3 no
discredit to any trans-atlantic line, if
you ask some Ludington by-stander
about the craft, he will tell you proud
ly that the Pere Marquette is “the
biggest sea-going car ferry in the
world,” and that she is apparently
transforming the Flint and Pere Mar
quette railroad, of which she is an ap
pendage, from a line almost wholly lo
cal in its business to a through truiJi
highway of commerce.
Further investigation will develop
a number of facts novel to most east
ern men. The so-called "sea-going
car ferry” is an important institu
tion on Lake Michigan. By its use
freight between the middle north
west—Wisconsin, Minnesota and the
Dakotas—and the great cities of the
northeastern seaboard —New York,
Boston, Philadelphia, etc., —can be
put through in a shorter period by at
least 36 hours than by any of those
lines which go round Lake Michigan
by way of Chicago, instead of across
it. Moreover, instead of paying ex
tra freight for this shortening of
transit, shippers actually make as big
a comparative saving in money as
they do in time. ,
That the shippers appreciate this
combination is abundantly proved by
the big business done by the various
car ferries on Lake Michigan. Those
who know most about these craft and
their performances feel assured that
they are bound to work nothing less
than a transformation in the carry
ing trade between the northwest and
the northeast. Already four vessels
are kept constantly busy in the trade.
Three of these are run in connection
with the Ann Arbor railroad, plying
between Frankfort on the Michigan
shore and one or two Wisconsin ports.
None of these three can compare fa
vorably either in capacity or appear
ance, however, with the Pere Mar
quette. being smaller and much more
like the car ferryboat Maryland, that
plies New York harbor in connection
with the Pennsylvania railroad, than
any other craft familiar to the eye of
Sunday Press readers.
The Pere Marquette plies between
Ludington, Mich., and Manitowoc,
Wis. She S3 a twin screw vessel, 350
feet long, of 56 feet beam and drawing
14 feet. Her compound engines—two
sets, working independent'v— were
built for the development of 3,500 horse
power. Her main deck is 35 feet and
is fitted with sufficient trackage on
her car deck to accommodate 30
freight cars of the largest size in use.
Owing to her ocean steamer-like build,
the cars, once safely loaded on her
tracks, are as secure from being wet
by the weather, as they would be on
land.
Lake Michigan, as every one knows,
is a pretty big pond and wide enough
for a good stiff gale to develop seas
mountains high, even if not as col
ossal as the heaviest ones developed
on the ocean.
Naturally, heavy seas result in a
deal of pitching and tossing and roll
ing about on the lake, exactly as they
would on the Atlantic, and were it not
for divers ingenious devices adopted
on board the Pere Marquette her
wheeled cargo would often be in im
minent danger of rolling from its
proper resting place into the fresh
green waters. These devices in
clude, besides automatic couples that
fasten each short train of cars firmly
to the snubbing posts on board, a
series of locks and chains that fasten
each individual car snugly to the rails.
These hold the heaviest cars as se
curely as if they were part of the
ship’s structure itself, and no matter
what the weather the Pere Marquette
makes its trips as uninterruptedly as
any steamer anywhere in commission.
Of course, this could not be so were
she not stanch and seaworthy. In this
regard she appears to be all that can
be desired, since she successfully has
weathered many a storm that has
wrought destruction to all sorts of
steam and sailing lake craft, includ
ing several bad spells of weather this
fall, without even suffering a delay
of more than an hour, and has also
proved herself able to cope with the
heaviest lake ice ever known to form.
Before she was put on. February,
1897, there were some predictions that
it would be ice, if anything, tuat
would interfere with her service. So
far. however, she has shown the
ability to plow through the product
of the heaviest freeze-up with all the
east in the world, though it is true
that she might be put to more delay -
than any she has yet experienced
it not for the pains taken by the rail- *
road company to keep the harbor open
for her.—New York Press.
Jingley—Ah, there comes our min
ister. He's the most unreasonable
man I ever saw.
Henson —In what way?
Jingley—Why, he tells me I ought to
give more thought to the future, and
In almost the same breath he wants
me to reflect upon the past. Now,
how's a fellow to do both at the 'jpsue
time?—Boston Transcript. *