The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 3, 1903, Page 8

WJTRUCTMWDM | | | SEPH . M. WEBER 7'k 1 Manager and Author.] Copyright, 1903, by Soeeph B. The question, “Shall a wife have a separate allowance of her own?"” must fnvariably be answered by a man, by His is the Wages of Wifehood. - éach woman's husband. last voice, the 1 word on the sub-} ject (not a too common event in mar- ried life), and all theories pro or con must vanish before his simple “ves” “no.” So an opinion on that all-important theme will perhaps be more authorita- tive coming from a man (a husband, . from a woman. subject con- on which r more or of course,) than the only marriage tesfimony is not mere man’s 100, It is perhaps nected = with woman's valuable than Jjs And—as a “mere man'—as a Bus- | band—as a -father—as a person of average common sense (I hope) and hones 1 say most unhesitatingly: “Every wife should have her own pocket money.” - And, I may add, if she is a good wife, she earns her allowance, no mat- ter how large it may be. Forsthe average housekeeper and homemaker does work that comes under the head of “skilled labor” of the most skillful kind and keeps it up daily for 2 term of hours that would cause her expul- sion from any labor union under -the | sun. For a man to expect to get such service and to pay for it merely by food, lodging .and clothes, is reminis- cent of the famous exchange column item FOR EXCHANGE—Cne eled 2-cent sta in perfectly good fon, for a diam tiara, & 24 at d or a corner lot Men don’t realize what an unheard- of good bargain a really good wife is. For the same amount of werk (not done half as well) any paid house- keeper would expect board and lodg- ing and at least $30 a month. Why grudge your wife the same sum?, AT A girl of my acquaintance was mar- ried a few months ago. On the re- turn from the honeymoon she had the ensuing little business talk vuth her husband. | “By the way, dear,” she begsn, ‘vou know I'm to keep the house in order, manage the servants, plan the meals, entertain your guests, - keep your clothes in good ‘condition and do a few | hundred more tasks of the same tri- fing nrder, What do I get out of all | this > The surprised benedict began mumble fond nothings concerning a lifelong devotion, the love of a good man, etc. But she cut him short. “For all that,” she said, “I make | full return in kind.. But what do I get for being your housekeeper and gen- eral supervisor?” “You get a good home,” he retort- ed, a little nettled, “and I will see you have as good lothes as any woman you know, and—" “Dear,” she ifterupted, “several . thousand people used to work for just those wages up to forty years ago. Only they were called slaves. And the country “showed its disapproval of such payment by abolishing that form of slavery and declaring it ille- gal. You couldn’t get any one on earth to-day to work for you for board and clothes wages. Why do you try to.force your wife t0?” Whereat, being at heart a sane man, he began to see light. And since thén they are happy; she prov- ing to be a model housekeeper and far more than earning the handsome sllowance he giyes her. bl S ] Personally, I began married .life with the allowance idea. My wife and I have separate bank accounts. I have no idea what sum of money she has in bank, nor is it any affair of mine. My sole affair is to see that she always receives her just allowance and that she shall be spared the hu- miliation of having to ask me for money that is rightly hers. For women are not like men in this matter of asking for money. If a man ie broke he seldom has dny vast hesitation in “touching” his best friend for the wheréwithal to tide over the difficulty. The flush of shame does not mount to his brow to any extent as he breathes the plea: “Say, old chap, can you lend me $10 till Saturday? But with women it is different. They ¥ate to ask their husbands for money. At least the best of them do. They don’t seem to realize that the hus- band's vow, “With all my worldly goods 1 thee endow,” makes his money as much theirs as his. If they could be brought to realize that, there would be far fewer heartaches. But #since, apparently, they cennot bring themselves to that wise frame of mind, I think husbands should save them embarrassment by making them a regular weekly or monthly al- lowance. « Let the sum be sufficient to pay for clothes and for the countless little ex- tras so dear to the feminine heart. There is no need for a man to impover- ish himself in order to do this. A com- mon sense talk before marriage should inform him as to how much (or how little) his future wife needs for spend- ing money, clothing, etc. If he can meet the demand he should do so. If not let him figure out how much of his salary he can afford to give her as an allowance; and if she is the right sort of girl she will usually make it suffice | on board-and-clothes wages. | such an encrmous sum to handle. she | and faltered.out the terrible truth as to { can’t be trusted to handle cash.” | w | Indeed, throughout the world, THE SAN FRANCISCO CAL THURSDAY, Of course there are women whose one joy In life is to spend their husbands’ money recklessly. There must be. The comic pavers and the bachelors say so. But there are also men mean enough to grudge daily bread to their wives, Everyday observatioh tells us that. So.the average is probably quite as much to one sex as to the other. Many a man who brands his wife as extravagant would “fall dead” if she | spent as much on her own amusements | as he spends on his. | Many a man grumbles that his wife | has mo idea of the value of money. | | When I hear a man say that sort of | thing I mentally explain his wife’s ig- norance of money values on the ground that she never has any money to exper- iment on. * $ioie . I once knew 2 man whose wife lived ; He was suddenly called out of town and left her $100 with which to manage the | house in his absence. In joy at having | rushed out and spent 20 cents—yes, twenty whole cents—on chocolates. The husband returned unexpectedly the same night and demanded the money he had left with her. Shamefacedly and trembling she handed him $99 80, the missing 20 cents. “Just like a woman!" sneered her | lord and master. “The best of them When a man dies and %eaves his for- tune to his wife, small wonder she so ften squanders it. Had she handled it more freely in its collector’s lifetime she would Jispense it more wisely after his death. | From the bottom of my heart I feel a deep pity for the average married »man. She earns her money as nobly and as romplelg\y as does any day la- borer. She keeps a man’'s house, rears | his children, makes his life happy. And ! for this she receives no pecuniary com- pensation beyond an inadequate | amount of money, too often ungra- | ciously given. Surely, a high price to pay for the privilege of writing “Mrs.” before her name! H An allowance—a liberal allowance— ungrudgingly bestowed—is the solution | to more domestic difficulties than this | world dreams of. Marriage a Barter? Is BY (MISS) DORA MAY MORRELL. (Copyright, 1908, by Joseph B. Bowles.) Even the superficial student of cus- toms knows that the idea of matri- mony as a two-sided affair in which woman has as much interest as man, | with her individual tastes as much to | be regarded, is scarcely two genera- tions old. Even now marrying is not | exclusively, the result of devotion of | man to woman and of woman to man. | |JOHN D. SPRECKELS, Proprietor . - THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL . Address All Communications to JOHN McNAUGHT, Manager DECEMBER 3, 1903. i Publication Office.. ..ccuvarasaareen .Third and Market Streets, S. F. THURSDAY... e R ke i dr DIROBM BB s i THE O production and resources of California. cent number of the Strand Magazine, ticle on the pampas plume industry in this State. STATE'S RESOURCES. In a re- London, is an ar- The writer, who is an Englishman, has visited California, and, speaking of the effect upon pampas grass of transferring it from the pampas of the Argentines, he says: “Like everything else in California, it was found that the trans- fer of this plant greatly growth and the beauty and utility of its plumes.” luxuriance of “Like increased its everything else in "California” tells in one phrase the won- derful story of the effect of our soil and sunshine upon | | all useful plants. Our yield of all fruits of the vine and tree is so enor- mous that persons outside the State are incredulous. When told the fact that a prune orchard in California has- produced an average of 1100 pounds of fruit per tree in one season, two | comprehend it, When they hear sixteen tons per trees bearing over one ton, they cannot for it lies outside of their experience. of our usual crop of grapes being ten to acre, and that our vines have produced individual bunches weighing from siyteen to twenty-two pounds, they have no personal experience to use as a standard of judgment. Michigan, New Jersey, are told that in | know, is as long So, when the peach-growers of elaware, Maryland and Georgia California the peach tree, for aught we lived as the oak, they refer to their own experience, which is that the life of the tree there is limited, seldom exceeding ten years, and averaging per- haps seven, and cannot comprehend the reason for the difference in longevity. But in that very fact lies an ad- vantage enjoyed by our peacm-growers here. When orchards have to be regularly replanted, and bearing time has to be waited are enhanced. for through several years, without profit, ! the expense of the business and the cost of production Those distant growers, subjected to these disadvan- tages, find another fact hard to believe, which is that a peach tree, set in the orchard in January or our other spring months, may be expected to bloom and bear fruit the same season. | precocity in bearing is characteristic of all of our fruit The olive in the Mediterranean countries does | plants. This strange union of longevity and of not bear until it is seventeen years old. Here it bears | at three years and is expected to throw a full crop at | seven. All of these facts, and numerous others which con- stitute the fbundation and permanence of our fruit indus- E:r\', it is our object to put before our readers regularly, | with the expectation that the story, validated by the sig- | natures of observers and experts, will be used to spread abroad infarmation that will enlighten the stranger as to the capacities of California. The latest of eral Chipman, by official figures demonstrated the magnitude of these publications, frof the pen of Gen- 3 president of the State Board of Trade, the Marrying formerly rested wholly with | iruit industry here as a leading interest of the State. In the East, as all men know, orchard crops are a side issue. In some States special attention is paid to some lines of the man as it yet does among depend- | ent womer. Probably when the prime- | val man rapped over the head and | carried off the woman who attracte him he was showing as much senti- ment as was needful, and her opinion was not sought. The girl who escaped | such masculine attention was an un- | fortunate, despised by her companions and by herself, too, that she was al- | lowed to walk in safety. i After clubbing went out of style, and barter became the rule, it was still the | male who selected, and the female who | accepted the result without demur. | of bartering has changed somewhat, | for do we not see our rich girls ge- coming buyers of dukes and other titled | men mnot too vroud to be sold in as open a market as if put up to auction? in civil- | ized and uncivilized lands, marriage re- | est ifthe apple. ruit production. Missouri has created' a special inter- New York, on the Fills of the Hudson | and at Hammondsport and around Keuka Lake, has de- veloped a great industry in grapes, producing principally the Concord and other congeners of the wild fox grape. chard crop. ests, because the | The peach in some Eastern centers is made a staple or- | But outside of California there is no State | that regards fruit production as one of its leading inter- climate and soil, by natural selection and daptation, do not indicate, as here, a special and friendly With the twentieth century the form | fitness for that form of production. The pre-eminence of California in this respect is tes- tified to throughout the East by certain commercial facts. | We speak of the odors of Araby when perfumes and their origin occur; | diamonds are thought of; Golconda and Kimberley occur when Cashmere and the Gardens of mains more a matter of sale than of | Gul are Jovned when we think of nature’'s floral gifts. sentiment, but the reaction has started | Now in exactly the same sense California has come to be associated with fruits. Everywhere in the East, mn any considerable towns, one sees “California fruit” stores, and which will some day make this im-| possible. When there was open to woman no career but matrimony to which any respect was attached it was natural that she should marry as she had op- portunity, all the more that she real- ized so little before entering upon it what matrimony weant. It was equal- 1y natural that the woman who did not marry presumably because not chosen should become an object of pity and scorn, for by being left she was proved lacking in those feminine attributes which attracted men—she had not been true to her sex, so to speak. Thus “old maid” became a stigma to avoid at any cost of one’s feelings if one pos- sessed more pride than heart; and many a woman did, and many a wom- an has married not for love or even for a home. but that on her tombstone might be written “Wife of.” It scarce- 1y seems that such a motive could in- spire one to so vital a step. Yet it did, and strongly in the years when wom- en’s career was domestic or nothing— when, in fact, she was a superfluous woman if not married. Even to-day, with all the possibilities open to the young woman, she will be heard discussing the respectivé merits of Fred or John and weighing one against the other, exactly as she would do if a third were to come into the bid- ding. Still, you see, a matter of sale, and sale no less that it is done under the guise of law and of respectability. If a woman is influenced by worldly conditions in her consideration of a man's proposal, or if she goes to him the complement of her nature, the be- ing who makes her glad she is a wom- an, she sells herself as truly as if she did it without the sanction of the law. There are women who do not marry because they will not marry without the sentiment that to them is the true sanctification of the marriage relation. There have always been such women— not ‘many of them, for they had to be strong enough to walk alone, and that is painful at best; and' they had not only to walk alone, but to face scorn for being braver and truer flnn the average of their sex. That many women formerly e'ntered the marriage state without any real drawing toward if is shown by the eagerness Wwith ich women have turned toward other means of support as these have opened up to them. Noth- ing has ever been seen in social econom- ics ke the welcome given by women to ways of self-support, and though the inrush of the sex into various lines has brought some evils, it has healed others, and the dist is like the fermentation in wine, that makes the mass zood and ultimately clears it from Duluth, Eastport, Maine, everywhere our fruit is scen. “the zenith city of the unsalted seas,” to It s there while the snow lingers in the late spring, and when it falls in early winter, and before either leaf or bloom is | on the Eastern tree, and long after both have fallen. With these advantages, and progressive improvement in packing and transportation, California fruit will hold | a lead in which it has already left the rest of the world Lfar behind. Nor is our field limited to the United States. Every season increases our fresh fruit shipment to Lon- don and widens its market in that metropolis. fruits, including Our dried raisins and prunes, are rapidly rcachim;l for the control of the world’s market in those products, and will finally conquer and hold it. This widespread influence of our products is based on soil and climate, longevity of trees and vines, and extraordinary produc- tion. As these elements inhere in natural and unchange- able physical conditions, which exist nowhere else as they do here, it will be seen that we have a specialty which none can take from us. We are just upon the eve of expansion in the charac- ter and ¥alue of our orchard products. When the plans of Mr. Swingle of the Agricultural Department are per- fected there is no reason to doubt that we will domesti- cate on the Colorado desert a date production that will supply the world. There the deglet noor, the “date of light,” the finest grown, can reach unlimited production as soon as adequate irrigation is provided. Now it is grown on oases in the Sahara, where it is laboriously irrigated with water drawn in buckets from deep wells, for any other reason than that he is|and is transported to railroads in Algeria on the backs of camels. He proposes also to introduce into Northern California the large pistachio nut of Syria, a high-priced article of commerce, which should flourish here like the almond. Natural fitness will domesticate with us other valuable exotic fruits to supplement our present standard sorts. Surely it is fitting that the press should seek to let/the world know all The Call. - these things, and that is the purpose of —— POLICE AND THE CRANK. D URING the recent visit of the President to New York to attend the funeral of his uncle the Police Department undertook to safeguard him. The arrangements were so imperfect that a crank was able to get to him. It is no answer to say that the crank was a harmless old featherhead, well known in California as a self-elected nuisance. The fact ié that if a crank intend- | ing no violence. could evade the police and waylay the President, an anarchist assassin could do the same thing and accomplish his murderous United States has to be guarded against attack, and is not 1 i) i i { : free to go and come in safety, like any other citizen, sore UR readers are urged to note the weekly publi- )rxpcneuce has proved that he is no longer safe from cation in our columns of facts relating to the|y,rm President Roosevelt chafes under the restriction He still leaves the White House on foot for long and vigorous walks,*or for horseback excur- sions, and when he is in the open, away from the crowd, But every citizen feels that Presidents are in danger in crowds and must of his liberty. is amply capable of defending himself. be guarded. Since Mr. William Randolph Hearst said in his news- “If a man in search of big game walked into a zoological garden it would be foolish of him to spend his time trying to kill a mouse, with ele- It is equally foolish to aim his blood and thunder at the old-fashioned little when the really big men are so and, describing the exe- cution of Louis XVI, said, “So when we hint that this republic is in danger now, just remember what a short time intervened between the King alive and drinking and | the King dead and all the peasants eating,” been spread a feeling among assassins that the road to national happiness and plenty lies in the assassination of papers in April, 1901: phants, tigers and lions all around. kings and emperors, plentiful and so near at home,” the President. The “murder of President McKinley upon those incendiary utterances, and since then we have seen a great increase in the number of half-baked crea- tures, full of mock heroics, who look upon the President as the actual source of want and qppression, whose death | Under these circumstances whole country is interested in safety for the person of the President and indorses the inquiry now in progress be- fore the Police Commission into the reason for permit- will bring in Utopia. ting the crank to waylay him in church. revelation of the perversity of the oblique mind that such precautions are necessary, in a time of peace and general prosperity, when the country has less reason than ever in its history to complain of economic or political con- But deplorable as it is, the fact exists, and good\ citizens can only hope for such a moderation of personal | and political criticism as will gradually efface the incite- ment of the weak and criminal to murder. ditions. Grover Cleveland owns a railroad that he can't sell Perhaps he might induce Bryan Mr. Bryan’s taking ways, admirably demon- strated in the Bennett affair, might suggest a solution of and which won’t pay. to accept it. which Cleveland is incapable. M SHAFROTH’'S FINANCE contract. The plan has some original features. Tt, in effect, re- I'verses the order of conversion adopted the greenbacks upon the resumption of specie pay- The greenback issue was converted into bonds by the process of selling bonds for the cash to redeem the currency. The Shafroth bill proposes now to reverse | that process by converting the bonds into greenbacks But by the.legal tender act of 1862 the greenbacks rested on the credit of the Government, and their value depended on its power to redeem them. bank law interposed and caused the conversion of the | bonds which redeemed the greenbacks into national bank currency to the extent of go per cent of their par value. This conversion could be effected only according to the | terms and conditions of the national banking law, safe- guarding incorporation, extent of credit and kind of se- curity. The Shafroth bill, in effect, extends this privilege of -converting bonds into currency to any holder of exist- It may be done by a banking corporation, by an individual, by a partnership. It will be observed that the bill would result in im- mediately converting the principal and the premium on bonds into currency. For instance, the new registered fours are at a premium of 33, so that a holder of that issue for $100 would receive a currency bond for $133, at one per ment. again. ing issues gf United States bonds. cent interest per annum for thirty years, once into $133 in currency. At the end of thirty years the new bond would be redeemed by the Government in the same currency in which the original bond was payable. As all of our bonds are now payable in gold, the founda- R. SHAFROTH of Colorado has introduced and had referred to the Committee on Banking and Currency a bill to authorize the issuance of cur-! rency redeemable in bonds of the United States. authorizes the Secretary of the Treasury, upon the presen- tation of bonds of the United States in amount not ex- ceeding ten miilion dollars per month, to issue in lieu thereof bonds to be known as currency bonds, in denomi- nations of ten, twenty, fifty, one hundred, five hundred and one thousand dollars, payable thirty years after date in the currency stipulated in the surrendered bond, and bearing interest at one per cent per annum. These currency bonds are to be issued in amount equa! to the market value of the bonds surrendered—that is to say, the new issue includes the par value and the premium on the old. The holder of the currency bond upon de- | positing the same in the treasury shall have issued to him a currency certificate of like denomination, certifying that it is secured by such bond, and made receivable for all | taxes and dues to the Government, and a legal tender for all private debts, except when otherwise stipulated in the there has followed close the It is a strange BILL. It in the case of The national| convertible at tion of the new currency would be gold, of course. The plan deserves the study of financiers. and will re- ceive it. If, as is possible, our entjre bonded debt were converted into the new one per cents the whole interest would be lowered. The national banks do not issue the full amount of currency warranted by their capital, be- cause the high premium on their bonds makes it more profitable to convert them into cash. Under this proposed law they would convert principal and premium inté cur- rency. But suppose the bill -bould work to comrt the whole outstanding bond issue into currency, the immediate ef- fect would be an inflation of the currency by nearly one hillion dollars. That deems to be the point at which the scheme becomes dizzy. But its novelty, its assimilation of the principles of the national banking law and its rever- sal of the order of enl'hdon and redemption of the green- backs make it worthy of consideration. The police authorities of Oakland received the other day an eloquent if not intended compliment to their abilities. A burglar, whom they had captured, attempted to hang himself in his cell. It is such pleasantries of police life as this that make us wish Oakland would lend us a few of her thief-takers for a while. There is little in police administration in San Francisco to cause such an effect. —_— ‘It is hardly credible that the Government consulting ‘pommission of Colombia discussed the assassination of United States Minister Beaupre as a political necessity. purpose. xcnaficfltmuwhévthear@nzlpflho! While it is deplorable that the Pmm-t'f mmumummmm The Unspeakable Camel. A tragic upsetting of the beautiful tableau in the prelude to “Ben Hur"” at the Grand Opera-house a few nights ago was only averted by the strong poise and self-control of the actors who impersonate the “three wise men.” In the setting for the scene appear three camels. One of these beasts of the desert is alive, the two companions in the picture are merely stuffed “property” affairs. It is with the live camel that this tale hath to do. Shortly before the curtain was rung up on the scene during the night in point some heedless wit fed three large and aromatic California onions to the real camel. The vegetables were gems as spec- imens of odoriferous garden truck. They were laden with the true onion flaver. Our friend, the camel, munched the fodder with evident de- light, for they were succulent mor- sels. Unfortunately the thoughtless wight who was guilty failed to fol- low with the all essential sen-sen. On the stage the omion burdened camel was led. As the curtain part- ed on the scene the “wise men” got a whiff of the exhalation of onions. | And -they got it strong. The longer they stood before the beast the strong- er became the offense. To move would have ruined the scene. It was a case of torture for art's sake, and art won. But just as the star of Bethlehem | gleamed forth the camel coughed. Imagine, dear reader, the tortures carried upon the breath of that cough. | Lesson in Orthography. Superior Judges at times during the trial of divorce cases experience | great difficulty in getting from female witnesses the exact language they claim to have heard husbhands use to their wives and vice versa. It is particu- larly trying to the jurists when the i language happens to be of the kind that in a divorce complaint comes un- der the head of “vile and opprobrious epithets.” Recently Judge Murasky spent ful- ly thirty minutes trying to learn from a female witness the words she said | she heard the defendant in the suit call the plaintiff. repeat them, madam,” finally said the Judge. The woman still demurred and then blushing furiously commenced spell- ing the words alleged to have been used. “That will do, madam,” said the court. “You will have to pronounce them.” The stenographer will do the spelling.” Self Criticism. Some music lovers were discussing the passing of the Tivoll. One said: “Do you know that one can weigh his own musical opinion—using the world's estimate as a standard—in as correct a scales and as easily as he can weigh himself physically? all form estimates of each musical number, but scmetimes wonder if such | opinions are based really upon our own knowledge or upon hearsay. The next time a melody occurs to you ask your- self what it is and by whom.. If you cannot remember your weighing scale | is ready. Just place your stamp of good, bad or indifferent upon the name- less song and then jot the notes down on paper, if you be musician enough, awaiting the time it shall be identified to you: if not, ask the first musician you.meet what it is. When identified, if it be the theme of the Kreutzer So- | nata by Beethoven, and you stamped it indifferent, know, gentle sir, that when you raved over Beethoven he was not yours but your neighbor’s god. If it be of the ‘Annie Rooney’ class. and | you stamped it good, you are utterly lost. If, on the contrary, the melody made your spine tingle and you longed for a job as a grand conqueror or something, when you have only a 2x4 stature, and you discovered it was ‘Wagner's great Tannhauser March, you may know that you really appre- ciated the music for its own worth and not because of anything you were told.” Speak Gentle. k yentle—it ban better far To rule by love dan fear; Bf Kk rough, yu stand nice chance o ge ghde smash on ear. Speak yentle to the coal man—he Ban easy to get mad; | Bf yu an't getting anv co-l By yinger, dat ban bad Speak yentle to poleesman, tu— Ay know he ban mean pup: But vu'l the use to taling him Ven yu skol get locked up? tlo to the Alderman Veu feeling blue, And mgyht ven he turn lfld. trick He skol whack up with yu Speak yentle to yure lady frends And give gude lots of bunk Ef yu skol lak to getting chance To put yure elothes in trunk! Bpa&k yentle t' Yim Yeffries, tu, y tank dis ban gude hunch— Dcn yn an't need to put yure face On Maester Yeftries' punch! yentle dvaryvhm yu go, pr:kd people skol forget That yu ban vnchin&or gude chance ey gmw-um Sentinel. Ceylow’s Exhibit. Stanley Bols, speclal commissioner for Ceylon to the World's Fair at St. Louis, now in New York, thus outlines the representation which his island will make. “Qur attention,” says Mr. Bois, “was invited to the forthcoming exposition at St. Louis by John Barrett, in Jan- uary last, and just at that time W. H. Figg, the mercantile member of the legisiative council, was in London. He was cabled to come over and canvass the situation, and report his judgment as to the expediency of having a rep- resentation for Ceylon. He came over to St. Louis, and upon his return the amml $80,000 out of Sinotimt $95,000 18 to be .x'p.:f,. ;"'"’ the qnmn of a building. The structure the colonial “You will have to | Unconsclously we | that will serve as the Ceylon court I expect to find about half finished. I was appointed through the ‘concurrent | preference of ‘the Governor - and - the planters of Ceylon in April last, sitice whigh time we have been .busy = with our preparation of a proper display | next year: .I.desire to be om the ground when the finishing tQuches are put upon the building, that nothing may be omitted that will thake it thor- oughly representative of Kandian | architecture. Our building s lo- cated adjacent to ‘the ., Agricul- tural bullding, and {s certainly very eligibly situated. It.will be our aim to install a thoroughly character- istic display, reflecting -the natusal re- sources of Ceylon, her soil products and Hhe results of- her Industrial -life. Besides, we shall give speelal prominehce to the articles in which we are building up trade in the United’ States. Chief among these will- be plumbago as a mineral produgt, and the two other articles which divide the honor of .prominerice as staples— products of the cocoa palm and tea. -Our. trade in black tea, which found its principal market In the United King-. dom, had -been on the wane, and we turned our uttention to the manufic- ture or curing of green tea for the American market. The export of gréen tea to the United Statey last year was 1,500,000 pounds, and thus far this year it has been 6,500,000 pounds, and we ex~ pect to reach the 1ooooooo mark for - the full calendar year.” Bols wilt go to London for the Chflstrn‘l holi- days, and return to St. Louis in April of next year with his family, remaining through the exposition. Menelik, Modern Ruler. . Emperor Menelik, wHo claims to be: the most blue-blooded of the monarchs of the Old World by reason of his al-’ leged descent in a direct line from King Solomon of Israel and the Queen of Sheba, has just issued & decree impos- ing the most severe and.rigorous pen- alties for any one found buying orsell- ing a slave in Abyssinia. He is bent upon abolishing slavery altogether in | his dominions, and when one takes into consideration the fact that sjavery of one kind or another still exists hot only in the realms of the Turkish Sultan of the Egyptian Khedive of the Shah of . Persia, the King of Siam and the. Em=- peror of China, but even in the feuda- tory States of British India, in the'Con- go Free State ruled by Iglnx Leopold: in Zanzibar, which is vassal to Great Britain, and in the colonial dependen- cies of France, Germany and Portugal in Africa, it muqt be admitted thdt Em- peror Menelik déserves a great deal of credit for his humanity and progress- iveness in honestly endeavoring to sup- press the most wicked of all traffic, namely, that in human beings. Menelik . is a far more enlightened ruler than is generally believed and has but little in common with his ferocious predecessor, Emperor John, who was wont to_slice off the noses of those who used snuff, to cut off the lips of thdse foupd smok- ing and to brand crosses In the hand of every Mohammedan who fell into his clutches, just by way of converting him into a Christian, e Prosperity .in. Mezxico. There is good reason for the qpti- mistie view of Mexico taken by the French experts who, after. personally investigating the mines and manufac- tures of that country, wreport that it is destinéd to experience a remarimble boom before many years. The basis of their belief is that the Mexicans will soon adopt the gold standard, giving their money a stability that will imme- diately invite further infloy of capital, not only from the United States, but also from France, Germany and Great - Britain. This will be practicaly all that is needed to ‘insure & wonderful expansjon of Mexican industries, for everybody who knows the country is. aware of the greatness of its natural resources. Properly developed it could °* support a population of Derhaps 50,700 - 000 in comfort and prosperity. When that development is attaired, and in proportion as it is approached, the United States will profit unless thers is suicidal recklessness In neglecting a market.—Providence Journak Wild Snails, Amulnlanuvfluhla.mlof snails sent to him from Italy recently, but .the Custom-house officials held them up because they could fipd ne duty to levy on snalls, and it did not seem right to let them in for nothing. It looked as if the snails would pass the rest of their lives in the Custom- house, but the man finally offered to pay duty on them as wild animals and the officials let him have them. Five Great Soldiers, Senator Daniel of Virginia said in a recent speech at Baltimore that the nineteenth ecentury produced only five soldiers who could be called great— Napoleon, Wellington, Von Moltke, Grant and Robert E. Lee—Leslie's Weekly. 3 Special information ‘business houses and mlk men by fornia c}\'m"c."m io # mui-h-l