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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Advocate, 1924-1-3, Page 2WHEN FARMING. FAILED MissIonn. If you are sighing for a lofty 'work, l€ great ambitions dominate your mind, i Jest watch yourself and see a eu do not shirk The common little ways of being kind. Burn down your• cities and leave our farms, and your cities will spring up again as if by magic but destroy our farms and the grass will grow in the etreete of every city in the country." ;it Bryan had wanted a concrete illus- tration of this sentence from his Cross of Gold speech, he mighthave found et in the ruins of ancient Mayan cities 1n the tropical wilderness of Guate- mala and Yucatan. Scients of the Carnegie Institution now engaged in the study of what is left of that finest Sower of A.merican Indian civilization have atheory that its downfall was due to the failure of Mayan farms. For the Mayas were a great agricul- tural people. Farming was the main occupation. Flourishing cities grew up; handsome, richly carved temples were erected. These temples were centres of agricultural instruction and the planting of crops was closely in- terwoven with religious ceremonies. The priests evidently possessed a high degree of astronomical knowledge; in fact, the greatest known achievement of American Indians was the Mayan calendar, which has been deciphered by Dr. Sylvanus G. Morley, So exact was this system of chronology that It differentiated any given day from any atter within aperiod of more than 850,000 years, In their calculations these astronomers made use of a sym- bol for zero five centuries before the Hindoos had invented such a symbol, and a thousand years before the zero came into use in Europe. Primitive Methods. Yet with all this mathematical and astronomical knowledge, by which times tor crop plantings were calcu Sated, the cultivation of the soil was Very primitive. The Carnegie Institution archeolo- gists think that most probably the same system was used then as is em- ployed by the Mayan Indians now liy era in a neighboring region. This con- e.ets in burning over forest and brush tread to clear a field. Atter one or two mops had been made on this land, it z. as allowed to lie fallow, and another field used, and so en until enough brush had accumulated in the first field for a new burning. With repeat- ed burnings, however, grass. eventual- ly ttkea possession. The Mayan farm- ers evidently lacked plows or other ef- ficent tools for tilling grass lands. About 550-650 A.D., it is thought, this conversion of farms into grass lands caused the desertion of the cities in Guatemala as the people moved north to obtain a better farming coun- try. Some archeologists have attributed this breakdown of the Old Mayan Em- pire to great Climate changes or dread- ful disease epidemics, but the Carnegie experts hold that the silent palaces overgrown with, tropical vegetation. r ere most probably a monument to wasteful farming methods. "And" Or "Balt." The well-known novelist Sir James . alarrie is a quiet, retiring man, but as he is a genius stories inevitably coI- lect. about him, In his book, Shouts and Murmurs, Mr, Alexander Woolcott tells two new ones. It seems that Sir James' whimsical fairy play Peter Pan, greatly puzzled the old-line theatrical men in London. They could not see how' it could pos- sibly succeed—until it did. Before its production Sir Herbert Tree thus ex- pressed himself to Charles Frohman, producer of the play; • `Barrie has gone out of his mind, Frohman. I am sorry to say it, but you ought to know it. He's just read ^ play. , He is going to read it to o e :am, warning you. I know I not gone woozy -in my mind, be - se I have tested myself since hear- - theplay; but Barrie must be mad. e has written four acts all about fairies, children and n d Inidin s running through the most incoherent story you ever listened to; and what do you Ruppose? The last act is to be set on top of trees!" The other story contains an ex - e of Barrie's wit. theeeve of one of the usual re- vivals of the play a player went to Barrie with the request that he be "featured in the play bills.: "And what would `featuring' be?" asked Barrie cautiously. Whereat the actor, growing expansive under this chow of interest, explained in detail that, though he scarcely hoped to be starred, he did aspire to have his name separatedfrom the lesser folk of the company by a large preliminary ' ;`AND ?" said Barrie.. "Why If you are dreaming of a future goal. When, crowned with glory, men shall own your power; Re careful that you let no struggling soul Go by uuaided in the present hour, If you are moved to pity for the earth, And long to aid it, do not look so high, You pass soma poor, dumb creature. faint with AU life is equal in. the eternal eye. If you would help to make the wrong things right, Begin at 'home; there lies a life - tittle's ton Weed your 'own garden fair for all `men's sight, Before you plan another's soil. God chooses His own leaders in the world, And from the rest He asks but will- ing hands, As mighty, mountains into place are burled, ' 'While patient tides may only shape the sands-. • .Ella'Wheeler Wilcox. to till Her High Compliment. Miss Toman had told the Sunday school superintendent that she meant to .give up her .class of boys; "I am convinced that I am not a teacher," ;she said. "I have done my beat, but it seems to me I have made little im- pression. Of course I love the boys,. but they are so unresponsive, so try- ing at times!" Bat the superintendent persuaded her to keep en. "Even if your teach- ing is wasted, which I do not admit," he argued, "the lite you have lived be- fore those boys has not been wasted." The truth of that remark came to her in an unexpected way the very next Sunday. The class were talking about heaven and how they should feel to Anti that some one they loved was not there. 'Supppose we think of it this Ivey, boys," she said. "We have been to- gether as a olas for some time. We have been good comrades, good friends; we have had good times to gether. Suppose we got the class to- gether in heaven and found three or four missing. You know how you would feel. Can't you zee how import- ant it is that we live, each and every ore of us, so that well all be present when the class meets,., in heaven?" The boys were looking at her with serious, wide eyes. "That applies to me as well as to you," she went on. "It is just as, im- portant that I live so that I'll be sure of meeting you in heaven. Suppose allpresent but me. Suppose were you hunted everywhere for me and couldn't find me. _What would you think'?'' The serious look on their faces deep- ened. It was, Jim, the noisiest, the most trying and seemingly the most un- responsive of them all, that answered, "We'd know, Miss Toman," he said earnestly, "that you hadn't died yet." The other boys nodded agreement. It was half in laughter, half in tears, that Miss Toman told the superintend- ent about the incident. "I wonder," she said, "if I'll ever receive a finer compliment than that!" 1 Qi ueer Collection. In Prag e is a museum devoted sole. 1y to a e election: of dress -fastening .. devices of all kinds and of au ages. (,why Bring itBack Then? : king example of "comber er" Punch tells of tee, grocer msrlked-- i•eerfully ,to bis cus. "sae �'S(ever I sell you a bad egg, hoe. ,a . eael; bring it hack, and I'll' give yon another one." "Character education which beans "Keep on Keepira' On!" "If the,day looks kinder gloomy And your chances kinder slim, If the situation's puzzlin', And the prosiiect's awful grim, If perplexities keep pressin' Till hope is nearly gone, Juat bristle up and grit your teeth And keep on keepin' on. "F ret in' never wins a fight t. . And fumin' never pays; .. There ain't no use in broodin' In these pessimistic ways; Smile just kinder cheerfully •Though hope is -nearly gone, And bristle up, and grit your teeth And keep an keepin' on. "There' ain't no use in growlin' Arid grumblin' all the time, When music's ringin' everywhere --And everything's a rhyme. Just keep on snaffle.' cheerfully. If hope is' nearly gone, And bristle up and grit your teethe And. keep on keepin' on. ee— t; -AND THE WORST LS YET TO COME Curiosities of the' Calender. Where does the New -Year actually begin? It starts, of course, six hours earlier in Central Europe than it does with us in Ontario, and the farther East you travel the earlier is its com- ing. But there must be a limit some where, for if you went on traveling. always eastward you would eventually circle the globe and arrive back in Eastern Canada.. It was agreed originally that the days should begin on the 180th degree of longitude, a line running from the North Pole to the South, exactly half- way round the world from Greenwich Observatory. But this was found to have curious results. The line passed right through a good many countries, so that the date might be Dec, 31 in one tow n and Jan,. 1 in another only a mile or two away. On one island it used to be a standing joke to send new -comers a note saying "I shall be glad if' you will come to lunch yesterday"! This led to so much confusion that an alteration was made in the date line. It now bends in various places in order to include the.whole of any country that lies in its path. ' • There are still some rather weird possibilities. ` If a steamer sailing from America to India reaches the. date line at midnight on - December 31st the captain puts his clocks far- r twenty-four hours and makes wad.tw yf e the date next moment January 2nd. A Year. What is .a year?, A'; man given to cold' 'science and cosi tic vision. will tell you that a year is the time , it takes for this insigniii- cant planet laboriously to 'make its way around an Inferior star. "Labor- iousl" in this case' means a: thousand miles .e minute, the earth' meanwhile revolving on its own axis at the slug- gish rate of .a thousand miles an hour, The spinning of our work!, its tire- less circling of the sun, the mad .rush of the whole' solar system toward the end of the endless street .ef the uni- verse—these have Human effect only in the coming of: night and day, the parade of the seasons and the passing of the years. What is_a year? To ' a child it is a stretch of school broken by daily play, holidays and vacations and brightened with a birth- al other animals that it had bitten be - day, It.is measured by the seasons and:fore it had attacked the boy had shown unmistakable symptoms of rabies, their 'sports, the studies and their "An' they say there hain's no cure!" sorrows, lamented the wozuan, To adolescence • it is something to . Bus even while they tallied the doc be parted with for a promise of the tor bad been dictating a dispatch over future. the telephone ta, the nearest tele. To youthful maturity it is a flying graph office, Now he caught the Wo - ed; gone before' it seems -well start- man by the shoulder and abo'b her 'ed; -a jewel to be tossed into the cap hysterical lamentations shouted to of the beggar Pleasure or handed her,."There ie a cure, a preventive!" grudgingly to sober faced Industry. The wild .glint left her set eyes, and To middle age it is a coin the, she broke into a fervent, "Halleluiah, worth of whose predecessors was • not i praise the Lord!" realized. -, Two days later tubes containing the To the old it•is the measure of the i Pasteur treatment .arrived, and the long past and the brief future. I doctor began graduated injections. at How dreary life would be 'without 11 once. The dead dog's brain when -ex- the• yardstick of the year! Existence misled under the microscope dis- unbroken by the green bills of recur,. closed a. true hydrophobic condition, ring spring, the brown plains of sum but, thaegh the animate that the dog Clet Understanding. The distraught tamily carie riding tiro the little, moim:ti de 'town' on two Mules, The father was. on one mule, with one small .girl sitting in front of:.: himt and another behind. On the other mule was the mother with a babe In her arms and a bay of ten behind her, They had :came twenty'miles•: from ` their acme in the heart of the 'Cara- herlauda. All had been w.eeiiiug. They drew up' in front of the 'doo- tor's °face,. and the woman tried in :. vain to tell the terrible thing that' befallen them. "It's the boy," said the father. A d then with a voice that broke :often he told oP. a rabid clog that had bitten_ his son, The boy had been in the road with his younger sister, and the dog had batten him twice. The creature was killed a mile Partner down theme.. r nil a cow and sever Iver, but meanw e His ship sees no New Tear's Day at mer, autumn's gold and winter's er-' had bitten died, the boy was saved, all. But ix he were sailing in the tip - posits direction he would - have two New Year's Days Supposing he reached the date line one minute be- fore midnight on January' 1st,' his clocks would be put back twenty-four hours, and the next day would also he January 1st. "Few parents, except possibly those who have a teacher's preparatory training, understand' fully how to deal with that most. tender thing, the heart of a child. Many parents experiment, and experience . teaches them, it is true,' but in the process of educating the parent, the soul of the child some- times receives scars that remain through life." The rate of pay of the British sol- dier was raised from ad. to 1s. a day in 1795, and he had to wait 122 years for his next increase. tat Very Likely.' Wooden Soldier. (to drum)—"Well, in a few days I'll" be minus. an arm, and you'll have your head beat off!" mine were a drab thing. Suppose life. and 'the possible danger period long began and ended with Time unmeas-f since passed. ured! It would not do. " 'With -all thy getting get under - For the years are the portions into; standing' is the Scripture that has goy which the bread of Hope is broken, i erned my life,' said the doctor. "Wheiz If the lost piece has fallen upon the.I was a boy an ill -trained physician flea- at Failure, tstill there stands' caused me much. suffering because he Time, the perfect waiter, to help the. did not understand. I still limp as a guest anew. I result of his mistake. I made a cove- We do not know how long old Time pant with the AInaighty that, if lie has served the years to man. Thee Would see me through medical college, first via% Egyptian who discovered, 1 would come back among my own with a stick and a shadow, what a mountain people and give them th year iy—he did not know,` either, Noel best I could of surgical and med clay man know how many years there' akill, Several yeara ago I made a will he before infinity overwhelms .he i trip to get the clinical facts and le calendar. I the technique of the Pasteur tree. But we shall. know when the bells! meat for rabies. This is the first tizn ring on New Year's Eve that one more I have needed that knowledge. Ye. year is ours. An the years behind arel i'43t understanding, know your tra as far out of our grasp as the -years.} well, then devote your wisdom to y of nemeses, of -Alexander .or of Char- fellows. ' lemagne. You cannot reach backward and undo the plucking of a blade of grYu's. But you can. reach forward and change the fortunes of a life. It is your. year. No Prince or Gov- atone- to Balfour, from Fanny Kemble ernor can have more of it than you. ;to' Sarah Ilernbardt, figure in the For the old man with the hourglass Countess : of Jersey's a sprightly " re - is the fairest of all the giverz.-Realth, zninisoences of the Victorian epoch. wealth, beauty, intellect,'space-all As a daughter of Lord Leigh and: the these can be divided' unevenly; but wife of Lord Jersey, she hasp known to each man is given the same year to most of the British nobility." When mold as he car, and will.. " Ile makes she was a child she shook hands with it big or little. the Duke of Wellington and was kiss - After 12 o'clock on ' -.December 3Ist, ed by the young Queen Victoria. One 1923,belongs to history,n g but 1924 be- longs to you! When the Kaiser Wore !kilts. A great many'notables,. from Glad - Regimental Pets in the British � r By Horace Wyndham The number of regimental pets in the Britieshr Army Is a considerable• one, for, -while on foreign service, sol- diers always make a` point of securing furred and feathered friends, which accompany them from garrison to-gar- risan and eventually follow the drum back to England. The" denizens, of the animal world which thus embrace a military career are of various kinds, and. include not only young bears, but lion and tiger cubs,.: dogs,, deer, goats, cats, mongooses, - monkeys and par- rots, etc. Mr. Atkins, indeed, has a very warm corner in his heart• for his dumb companions, and every time the barracks; camp, or cantonments echo a bugle there is to the shrill blast of b g certain to be one of them near at hand. Most of them seem to know by instinct 'when it is one o'clock. At any rate, the moment the welcome "dinner -calk" is sounded, every dog: in barracks * 11 scamper acrosgr the parade -ground. to the cook -house door and apply for his rations like a true -born soldier.' In fact, it might be said "hounds meet at one p.m." . On the: coldest winter's. night, too, the guardroom cat may be! sure of'the warmest corner beside the fire, and a brimming saucer of milk' to reward her efforts when she catches; a mouse. Regimental pets, indeed, are invaibiy treated with a kindness that if generally copied in • other circles would -reader the activities of the S. P. C. A. abortive. It is not re- markable, therefore, that -most of them live to a considerabie°'age. •Regimental Goats. There are black spots, however, on: the escutcheons of regimental; goats. Of one of them it 18 said that, `when ,marching ,at the head of his battalion during the South Mfr�lcan War, he but - ted a Boer Ge'iieral who was signing the oath''o! aliegiarco.. This: scandal- ons action very<nearly had the effect' of prolonging the campaign. The Welsh Fusiliers have had a "Billy.' for, their pet ever- since„ they fought at Brinker" :11711„•and ,weep. Victorian pre - inthe school beging six years too late. ' The New and the old.., seated, several specimens from the fa- i -t was fa- . teacher,-wheasaid (Give. Wide—"I never: noticed" skis': was �.:mous dock in VJlndsor'Park.,'A-Much- ale a child until he is 7 years old and wearing her last winter's 'suit.:until traveled 'goat''was arts that a 'Lancer l care not who has him afterwards' today,” regimentsbraug.ht back from Matahele- gut character education must go back Huby-- What called your:; attention ;land. When, however, . the troop-shrp. beyond the child in the home. It roust to it? arrived at Southampton, a flinty-heart- g- " P>_.�P`' I h ; I �' ,' Boar of 'sag-rival-tursa refuarte -nee tZot rn with E_.o parents, C ifr . & ar new at. ed d mission for it to come ashore. Poor' mal world, the British soldier prefers "Billy" had, consequently, . to stop a dog; and when a battalion embarks where he was, and, as the vessel was for foreign' service' it ieeellowed to be just "starting .off, on another voyage, accompanied by a . email; canine con - sailed to'India.,, 'Returning a few tingent, not exceeding eight in' num- weeks later,. the shib;touch.ed.at.ports- ber. Some of thenkbeeome veritable mouth. Hem "Billy" ou:.d a frien •.in "dogs of war" and:r earn medals like a staff officer, who by'some means gab their masters, Sealon as-•the.year him landed_ and .provided him with 186 the Royal Marin ere folia ed shelter. To travel 20,000 miles before in Spain during the Cerlist troubles by a terrier called ""Dash";. and "Sandy," of ,the Royal Engineers, and "Jack" of the , Scots Guards, were wounded by Russian bayonets at: Ink ernan. -When they returned from the Crimea a .medal was fastened. round each- of their, necks by Quen Victoria. Of -more comparatively recent times a e famous regimental v ry u dog.: was who,', appropriately enough, be- longed to the Berkshires. At the Bat- tle of Maiwand an Afghan."bullet laid "Bob," who, appropriately enough,; be - for dead. To everybody's. surprise and joy, however, 'six weeks later "Bob". limped into Kandahar. H -e was :only a shadow of his former self, but rest and gond nursing worked wonders, and he returned to England with `his regi- ment. en :the wellkuow.u, painting, "The Stand of the last Eleven at Mai wand," the artist shows Bob barking defiance at the enemy. A considerable number of ;dogs went, through the being able to bleat on terra firma is probably a record in the goat kingdom. Many Strange Pets.• Soldiers have made some rather curious pets when on foraign service. Among such was `•'Derby," a black ram" belonging to' the' 95th Foot. After life, he years f m -liter fe fell severalye s a a �, Y down a well and met with a Y watery grave. The 2nd. Middlesex :Regiment tonce had a mule, which followed them in Indian and:' South Africa; , and the Yorkshire Regltnent have:adopted .a donkey which wandered, ineea, their camp at Peshawar. A familial "feature of,garrison 'life at Gibraltar was e Bet donkey called ;_"Jenny." This intelli-. gent little �aniraal used to carry letters and pa,reels for the. lookout men up to the signal -station perched on the too of "the Rock; However, poor "Jenny" went the way of all quadrupeds. The following memorial notice in the sig- nal station visitors' book records -her ,faithful service:— "Died, en the lath of November, 1910, nanny,' for many years the pet of the station, while a local laureate has added'those touching lines:— "'Tis hard to, have, to gaze upon her trim and well=kept carcase; Good-bye, Old' Girl, thy work is done, naughtelse but death could part us." . . The strangest of all `regimental viae - cots, however, was "Peter;' a goose which accompanied -the Grenadier Guards from Canada, to • England and took up his . quarters at the Tower. But for, his adventurous •disposition (which ° led hien to explore ,the world outside the barrack -yard, and get run over by a cab), "Peter" might still be living.' The .drummer boys gave him a military.Puneral, and his bones and feathers resit t; imieit 'the eagstoives of. the courtyard.. , Dog Preferred, 'Bat, of all the denizens of the ani - South African War, and distinguished themselves on the veldt:. Some : of them also officiated .as • four-!:hoad sen- tries round the block -houses, and'more than once gave timely warning of°the approach • of : a Boer command. .'f he 12th Lancers had a big retriever called "Jack," and the Irish Mileswere Pol- lowedby "Billie," a brindled bull -dog. Later on, Billie fell temporarily under a aloud. It was not, however, alto- gether h.is;faut, hat that of a butcher'a boy who threw a stone-at:him. ' Na turaly, resenting this- insult, 13111ie in -serted his teeth in a tender portion. of the youth's anatomy. A self-respect- ing dog who had fought for his coup try an earned a couple of medals could scarcely do less. The authori- ties, however, took a somewhat,severe view of the case, and 811113 was or- dered a prolonged rest -cure. This' ap- parently preyed on him to such an .ex- tent ;that he showed' signs of illness. With Chec Thereupon, to the relief of his friers h kin s' p ds,: 'The g he was restored to his ,,kennel in bar- !)mus now." racks. `vee— vith eb of her girlhood memories' ie of the wedding of the Prince of Wales in 1863, in connection with which slut they worn the 'u ficer. -- "I am very er; "he bad Leopold' that : lo rt they ( to °look a Scottish _s wear." An "early militarism! esent ex -kaiser,. then Prices. four, came over with the wedding. He apt reinony in a Scottish lie :fxMini ladies re - his mother, saying d that he was to have form of a Prussian of •orry,"-replied his moth - on, but Beatrice and teageee •awing o ridiculous with tail m off, and so we ha ntli we found an old is unole'e for him to ish protest against I' ha' waii$or T Wi' ever. - ngti The- ar P re o g.. ,,. is m h ou h g Was eve' for: T! Wi' phlduiid "P Th o0 Ls ev ed No begg�; what hlas cal1e but Did; feed. ;ca eve's -.«ft, en Aye, an -d thou ;h u11'mauy a sin Ha' tricked me from Thy path, I never feared to ask Thee in Full knowing Thee on earth beiore7 -. an's Song. y coming,' Lord, le's green, r wbitewashed cot 11, and mean; ee to pass i*, neat out grass; r on:. the latch, oe'er hiss need, hat my Ann andl Neer scorned a sorrowing • sinn+r'. door. Lord, I be eight an 'diXty' ear,' My meetin' wi' The 's d .ate g r , n .near. A'11 take it kind :w"arn we• shall meet If Tbou "shalt say nil .dowlprs were The- sweet, tea well' brewed, t •ri ri knot, Same bgggar we ha' helpeford baliw ...was, but Thee, Lord, in earth': :dis gue Descendedis from Thy Paradise, Hoote J'ae red Careers. Europe are mere ltered ci`e.':.„