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HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Herald, 1924-01-03, Page 5�.l • WHEN FARM XNQ FAILED M;ssion+ Xt you. are sighing for a Jetta' work, If great anbitione dozuinaate year mind, teat watch yourself and sea you 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 fazing and the .grass will grow in the streets of every .city in the country." If Bryati had wanted a concrete illus. *ration of thie sentence from his Cross of Gold speech, he might have found it in the ruins of ancient Mayancities in 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 flower of American Indian civilization have a theory that its downfall was due to the failure of Mayan farms. For the Mayas were a great agricul- tural people. Farming was the plain 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 tact, 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 other 'within a period of more than 1150,000 years. In their calculations these astronomers made use of a sym- bol for zero five centuries before the Rindoos had invented such a symbol, end a thousand years before the zero same into use in Europe. Primitive Methods. Yet with all this mathematical and Astronomical knowledge, by which times for crop plantings were calcu- lated, 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 liv- lag in a neighboring region. Thiscon- e_sts in burning over forest and brush land to clear a field. After one or two crops had been made on this land, it was, allowed to lie fallow, and another field used, and so on until enough brush had accumulated in the first /laid for a new burning. With repeat- ed epeated burnings, however, grass eventual- ly takes possession. The Mayan farm- ers evidently lacked plows or other ef- flcent 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_eliznate ohanges or dread- ful disease epidemics, but the Carnegie experts hold that the silent palaces overgrown with tropical vegetation are most probably a monument to wasteful farming methods. "And" or "But." The well-known novelist Sir James Barrie is a quiet retiring man, but as he is a genius stories inevitably col- lect about 'him. In his book, Shouts and Murmurs, Mr. Alexander Wooloott 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 ane a play. He is going to read it to you, . so I .am warning you. I know I have not gone wcozy in my mind, be- cause I have tested myself since hear- ing the play; but Barrie must be mad. He has written four acts all about fairies, children and Indians running through the most incoherent story you ever listened to; and what do you suppose? The last act is to be set on Lop of‘trees!" The other story contains an ex- ample of Barrie's wit. On the eve 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 lahowof interest, explained, in detail that, though he scarcely "hoped to be. starred, he did aspire to have 10 name separated from the lesser folk of the company by a large preliminary "AND." "AND?" said Barrie "Why hot BUT?" Queer Collection, In Prague is a museum devoted sole- ly to a collection of dress -fastening devices of all kinds and of all ages. Why Bring ltBack Then? As a striking example of "conrmcr- cial candor" Punch tells of the :grocer who remarked cheerfully to his cus-. tinter: "1f ever I sell you a bad egg, Mr. Clihbitt, bring it back, and 1'11 glee you another one:" "Character education which begins in the school begins six years too late. It was a wise teacher who said, 'Give me a child until he is 7 years old and 1 care not who has him afterwards.' But character education must go back beyond the child in the home, It must begin with the pareittiO' if you are dreaming of a future goal, When, crowned with glory, men' Shall own your power, Be careful that you let no struggling soul Gro by unaided 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 some poor, dumb creature faint with thirst— All life is equal in the eternal eye. If you would help to make the wrong things right; Begin at home; there lies a life- time's toil' Weed your own gardenfair for all men's sight, Before you plan totill another's soil. God chooses His own leaders in the world, And from the rest He asks butwill- ing hands, A's mighty mountains into place are hurled, While patient tides may only shape the sande. —Pula Wheeler Wilcox. 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!" But the superintendent persuaded her to keep on. "Even if your teach- ing is wasted, which I do not admit," he argued, "the life 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 nest Sunday. .The class were talking about heaven. and how they should feel to find that some one they loved was not there. "Suppose we think of it this way, boys," she said. "We have been to- gether as a cies 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 see how import- ant it is that we Iive, each and every one of us, so that we'll 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 fust as im -portant that I live so that I'll be sure of meeting you in heaven. Suppose you were all present but me Suppose °you hunted everywhere for me and couldn't find me. What would you think?" The serious look en 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!" O "Keep on Keepin' On!" "If the day looks kinder gloomy And your changes kinder slim, If the situation's puzzlin' And the prospect's awful grim, If perplexities keep pressin' Till hope•is nearly gone, Just bristle up and grit your teeth And keep on keepin' on. "Prettin' never wins a fight And fumin' never pays; There ain't no use in broodin' In these pessimistic ways; Smile just kindereoheerfully Though hope is nearly gone, And bristle up and grit your teeth And keep on keepin" on, • "There ain't no use in;growlin' And grumbiin' all the tine, When music's ringin' everywhere And everything's a rhyme. Just keep on smllin' cheerfully If hope is nearly gone, And bristle up and grit your teeth And .keep on keepin' on. The New and the Old. `W1fle—"I never noticed she was Wearing. her last winter's suit until 'today." fuby--,--"What called your attention to it?" Wipe--•"Ber'new hat."' ..-AND THE vv9Rsiis' T TO COME qlfrw0.11, Curiosities of the Calendar. 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 countriesso that the date might be Dec. 81 in one town and Jan. 1 in another only a mile or two away. On one island it used tobe 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 irrelude the w, le .country that lies in its pith. There are still some rather weird possibilities.,- If a steamer sailing from America to. India reaches :tle date line at midnight on December 31st the captain puts his clocks for- ward twenty $our hours and makes the date next moment January 2nd. A Yew, What is a year? A man given to cold science and cosmic vision will tell you. that a year is the time it takes for this insignifl^ cant' planet laboriously to make its mule was the mother with a babe in Get Understanding., , The distraught family came Ming Into the little mountain town on two mules. The father was on ono :mule, with one small girl sitting in trent of hint and another behind. On the other way around an inferior star. "Labor- iously" in this case means a thousand miles a minute, the earth meanwhile revolving on its own axis at the slug- gish rate of a thousand miles an hour. ,The spinning of our world, its tire- less circling of the sun, the mad rush of the whole solar system toward the end of the endless street of 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 abirth- fore it had attacked the boy had shown day. It is measured by the seasons and unmistakable symptoms of rabies. "An' they say there hain's no cure!" lamented the woman. Bue even while, they talked the dog - tor had been dictating :a dispatch over - the telephone to the nearest tele- graph office. Now he .caught the wo- her arms and a boy of ten behind her. They had come' twenty miles from their home in the heart of the Cum- berland's. A11 had been weeping," ahey drew up in front of the dock tor's office and the woman tried in , vain to tell the ;terrible thing that had befallen then. "It's the boy, said the father. And then with a voice that broke often he told of a rabid dog that had bitten his ,• son. The boy had been in the road with his younger sister, and the dog had bitten him :twice. The creature was killed a mile farther down the river, but meanwhile a cow and sever- al other animals that it had bitten be - their sports, the studiesand their sorrows. To adolescence it is something to be parted with for a promise of the future. To youthful maturity it is a flying thing, gone before it seems well start- man by the shoulder and above her ed; a jewel to be tossed into the tap hysterical . lamentations shouted to of the beggar Pleasure or handed grudgingly to sober faced Industry. To middle age it is a coin the worth of whose predecessors was not realized. To the old it is the measure of the long past and the brief future. How dreary life would be without the yardstick of the year! Existence unbroken•by the green ]kills of recur- ring spring the brown plains of sum-. her, "There is a cure, a preventive!". The wild glint left her set eyes,and she broke into a fervent,' "Hallelujah, praise the Lord!" Two clays later tubescontaining the 'Pasteur treatment arrived, and the dootor began. graduated injections at once. The dead dog's brain when ex- amined under the microscope dis- closed a -true hydrophobic condition, but, though the animals that the dog er, autumn's old and winter's er- ' had `bitten died, the boy was saved, H's ship N Year's Day atm g 1 zp sees no New ea and the.possible danger period long all. mine were a drab thing. Suppose life But it he were sailing in the op- began and ended with Time unmeas- posite direction he would have two ured! . It would not do. New Year's Days! Supposing he . For the years are the portions into reached the date line one minute be- which the bread of Hope is broken. fore midnight on January lst, his if the last piece has fallen upon thel I was a boy an ill -trained physician clocks would be put back twenty-four floor of Failure, stili there stands t caused me much suffering because he since passed, " 'With .all thy getting get under- standing' nderstanding' is the Scripture that has gov- erned my life;' said the doctor. "When hours, and the next day -would also be Time, the perfect waiter, to help the January 1st. guest anew. We do not know how long old Time "Few parents, except possibly those who have a teacher's preparatory did' not understand. I still limp as a result of hie mistake. I made a cove- nant with the Almighty that, if He has served the years to man. They would see me through medical college, first wise Egyptian who discovered,'', I would come back among my own training, understand fully how to deal with a stick and a shadow, what a mountain people and give them the with that most tender thing, the heart: year ie—he did not know, either. Nor best I could of surgical and medical of a child. Many parents experiment,! can man know .how many years th3re skill. Several years ago.I,made a long and experience teaches them, it is' will be before infinity overwhelms the trip to get the clinical facts and learn true, but in the process of educating' calendar. the technique - of the . Pasteur treat - the parent, the soul of the child some-' But we shall know when the bells ment for rabies. This is the first time l I have needed that knowledge. Yom, times receives scars that remain ring on New Year's Eve that one more . imam van* trade through life." The rate of pay of the British sol- dier was raised from 8d. to 18. a day lemagne. You cannot reach backward in 1795, and he had to wait 122 years and undo the plucking of a blade of for his next increase. grass. But you can reach forward and change the fortunes of a life. It is your year. No Prince or Gov- ernor can have more ofit than you. .For the old man with the hourglass is the fairest of allthe givers. Health;' Wealth, beauty, intellect,' space -all these can be divided unevenly.; but to each man is given the same year to mold as he can and will. He makes it big or little. After 12 ,o'clock on December 31st, 1923, belongs to history, but 1921 be- longs to you! year is ours. All the-yearsbehind are get understanding, well, then de -vote your wildom to your as far out of our grasp as the years fellows" of Rameses of Alexander or of Char- o Very Likely. • Wooden Soldier (to drum)—"Weil, in a few days I'll be minus an arm, and you'll have your head beat off!" cgimdlltal Pets in the British A The number of ,regimental pets in the Britiesh Army is a considerable one, for, while on foreign service, see diers always make a point of securing furred and feathered' friends, which accompany them from garrison to gar- rison 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, eta Mr. ' Atkins, indeed, has a very warm corner in his heart for his dumb companions, and every time tho- barracks, camp, or cantonments echo to the shrill blast of a bugle there is certain to be one of them near at hand. Most of them seem to know by instinct lonce. hada mule, which followed them when it is one o'clock. At any rate, the moment the welcome ."dinner -call`' ' in Indian and South .Africa; and the barracks will Yorkshire Regiment have adopted a scamper across the parade -ground to .donkey which wandered 'into 'their the cook house `door and apply"for his camp at Peshawar.. A familiar feature rations like a eaue-born soldier. In'1 of garrison life at Gibraltar was a pet fact, it might be said "hounds meet ' donkey called "Jenny." This inteili- at one p.m." On the coldest winter'&'�gentlittle animal used to carry letters night, too, the guard -room cit may be ; and `parcels for the lookout men up to sure of the warmest corner beside the the signal -station perched on the top fire,- and a brimming saucer of milk or the ,Rock. however, poor Jenny to reward her efforts when she catches . went fife way of all Quadrupeds. The. a mouse. Regimental pets, indeed, following memorial notice in. the sig-; are invariably treated with a kindness nalstation visitors' book records her that if generally copied in ether faithful service:— circles would render the activities of Died, on the 18th ' of November, the. S. P. C. A. abortive. ' It is not re- 1910, 'Jenny, for many years the pet markable, therefore, that most of them of' the station," while a local laureate mission for itto come ashore. Poor "Billy" had; consequently, to stop where he -was, and, as the vessel was just, starting off on another. voyagee sailed to India. Returning a few weeks later, the ship touched at Ports- mouth. Here "Bally" fou:_d a friend in a. staff officer, who by some means got him landed and provided him with shelter, To travel 20,000 miles before being able to bleat on terra firma is probably a record in the goat kingdom. Many Strange Pets. Soltdiers have made some rather -curious pets when on foreign service. Among such was "Derby," a black ram belonging to the 95th Foot. After several years of a military life, he fell down a well and met with a watery grave. The 2nd Middlesex Regiment live to a considerable age. • has added •theie touching lines:—. Regimental Goats. ''"Tis -'hard to have to gaze upon -her trim and well -kept carcase; There are black spots, enahowever, on Good-bye, Old Girl, thy work is done, the• eseutcheons of. regimental goats, naught else but death could part Of one of them it is said that, when us marching at the head of his battalion (-uring the South African War, he but- The strangest of all regimental mas- ted a Boer General who was signing, cots, however, was "Peter,' a goose the oath of allegiance. This scandal which accompanied the Grenadier ous action very nearly had the effect Guards from Canada to England and of prolonging the campaign. Tho took lip his quarters at the Tower, Welsh Fusiliers have hada "Billy" for But for his adventurous disposition their pet ever since they fought at (which led him to explore. the world Bunker Hill; and Queen Victoria pre- sented several specimens from the fa - Mous flock in Windsor Park. A ntuch- .traveled goat was one that a Lancer 'regiment brought back from Matabele- land. When, however, the troop -ship arrived at Southampton, a flinty -heart- ed ed Hoard of Agricaltarrr refused per - :out eve live a in fen side the barrack-yaid, and get run ties, however, took a somewhat severe. r by a cab), "Peter" might still be view of the case, and Billie was or-' ng. The drummer boys gave him dered a prolonged rest -Cure, This ap- ilitat•y funeral, and his bones and parefltly preyed on him to such an ex- .-- thers rest under the flagstones of tent that he showed signs of illeess. With,•Checkcred. Careers. Thereupon, to the relief of ills friends, "'The Dings of.. Europe are mere. he Was restored to his kennel in bar- pawns now." raeias. "Yes with checkered Careers," mal world, the British soldier prefers a dog; and when a battalion embarks (for foreign service it is allowed to be accompanied by a small canine con- tingent, not exceeding eight in num- ber. Some of them become veritable "dogs of war" and earn medals like their masters. So long ago as the year 1836 the Royal Marines were followed In' Spain during the Carnet:, 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- erman. When. they returned frons'the Crimea a medal was fastened round each of their necks by Quen Victoria. Of more eomparatiyely recent times a yery famous regimental dog was. "Bob," 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" iimped,,into Kandahar. He was only a shadow of his former self, but rest and good nursing worked wonders, and he.returned to England with his regi- ment. In the well-known painting, "The . Stand of the last Eleven at Mal - wand," the artist shows Bob barking defiance at the enemy; "A considerable number of dogs went . through the South African War, and distinguished themselves on the 'Veldt. Some of than also officiated as four -footed en- tries round the block -houses, and more, than once gave timely warning of the approach of a Boer command. The 12th Lancers had a big retriever called "Jack," and the Irish Rifles were fol- lowed by "Billie," a brindled bull -dog. Later on, Billie- fell temporarily; under a cloud. It was not, however, alto- gether his 'fact, but that of a butcher's - boy who threw a stone at hint. 'N,i- turaly, resenting this insult, Billie in- serted his teeth in a ,tender portion of the youth's anatomy. A .self-respect- ing dog who had fought for his coun- try and earned a couple . of medals could scarcely do less. Tho authors. When the Kaiser Wore Kilts. A great many notables, from. Glad- stone to Balfour, from Fanny Kemble to Sarah Bernhardt, figure in the Countess of. `Jersey's sprightly re- miniscences of -the Victorian. epoch.._ As a daughter of; Lord Leigh and. the wife of Lord Jersey, she has, known most .of the British nobility. When' she was a child she"shook 'hands with the Duke of Wellington'and was kiss- ed by the, young Queen Victoria. One of her girlhood 'memories is• of the. wedding of the Prince of Wales in 1863, In connection with which • she says: The present ex -kaiser, then Prince William, aged four, came over with his parents for the wedding. He ap- peared at.the ceremony in a Scottish suit, whereupon the German ladies ;re- monstrated with his mother, ,sailing they understood 'thathe was tb have worn the uniform of a Prussian of- ficer. "I am very sorry," replied his moth- er; "he had it on, but Beatrice .and Leopold. (the Duke of Albany) thought that he looked so ridiculous with toile that they cut them off, and so we had to look about until we :found an old Scottish suit of his•uncle's for him to w ear." An early English protest against militarism!' • 8 An Old Man's Song. • I' ha' waited for Thy coming, Lord, Wi' every ;springtime's • green,. The garden fore our 'whitewashed cot Though ''tis but small, and mean, Was ever lit for Thee to pass. Wi' phlox and pansy, neat cut grass, The door was ever on the latch, No beggar„ whatsoe'er his, need, Iia's called, but what my Ann and 1 Did feed him even as we feed. Aye, and though full many a sin Ha'' tricked me from Thy. path, I never feared to ask Thee in Full knowing Thee on earth before Neer scorned a sorrowing sinner's' door, Lord, 1 be eight and sixty year, My ineetin' wi' Thee's drawing near,' All take it kind `vhen',we. shall meet If Thou` shalt, say mi lowers were. sweet, The tea well brewed, fot then I'll know Some beggar we ha'-. helped below Was but Thee, Lord; in -earth's dis- guise. Descended from -Thy Paradise, -'P. Hoole Jackson. the courtyard. Dog Preferred. 1fux, `el. all the denizens of the ani:-