The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1882-03-29
For the Farmer and Mechanic.
NEwBERN, Mach Is.

the other Republicans"
For the Farmer and Mechanic.
NEwBERN, March Is.
Thank you for the compliment you
paid me in your last issue 1t Is not
every IN of whom you eau say
that as usual she has something to
say when she saws something !" | hope
[ shall not forfeit my certificate by say
ing | have just returned from Harksr's
Island. where | went to see my friend
Miss Bell and to get sea gulls for STUFF
fug. Somebody else went along to
shoot the gulls, and you must Lot think
| am stufhng-not them. but your read
ers, when | tell you what one brave
has done towards civilizing-nor
the Brokers-but the Bankers-of
Harker's Island a small island, IN
Beaufort Harbor, about seven miles
from the town of Beaufort. Before the
war, and for sometime after it, 1t was
said to be unsafe for a stranger to spend
y night at Harker's. but urdetsrred b,
it's bad reputation, Miss Jane Bell. the
daughter of an English Church of Eng
land clergyman. and a oma of indie
pendant means, moved by the same
spirit hat animated the great mission
airy David Livingston, took up her
abode here, living In q little shanty
where she daily assembled the children
of the island and began teaching them
to read and work. Like Livingston,
she believed people must first be civil
lied then christisnized and. unlike MIR
= \ = She thous Ut 1t a. lmpol
tant to teach these children how to
work as To teach them how to read.
But these views did not meet the ap-
prevail of the Evangelical Missionary
societies to whom she once applied for
aid, SO sic has been left TO work out
her problem without assistance from
them. amt nobly has she done SO.
From being most desperate set U
ruthanS who neither feared
rod nor regarded man, the people Vi
Harker's Island have become quiet,
orderly citizens, following the usual
avocations of that part OF the country
in a civilized manner. When she open
ed her school first iu 1864 there wer,
not ten people on the island VIII, could
write their now al the inhabl-
tants can read aui wlite, and the
school. Which she still keeps up in sum
ncr, numbers forty five children
Though assisted by her personal friend.
Miss Bell has never had "A dollar from
any church or society to aid her in he
good work. her great desire now is 10
establish a school in which the children.
not only of Harker's Island, out Of the
Straits, can be brought together auG
taught not book learning only" but
to cook, wash and iron. garden. rear
poultry and pigs. attend to cows, butter
making, &c. She intends that the
parents shall contribute, according to
their means, to the support of the chill
dren, many OF whom are so poor that
she now often has to feed the stomachs
as we'll As the minds Of her scholars;
others live too far off to 70 back auu
'Orth daily, 81, to start her schuol, she
must have funds to bull! a house where
'ler scholars can he logged and led
he proposes to go North this suuImer
aid try to raise ii thousand dollars to
:segln with, but If our legislature would
ave her 4 slice out of the appropriation
t iey give to St Johns Asylum. and
.t her take a certain number or the
state orphans from that locality to be-
Gu with, they would find that the boys
nd girls whom she would send out
would be far better citizens than thos,
ground out by the Mills of St. Johns
asylum. She is 4 poultry fancier and
las q large stock Of chickens of differ
eat breeds, last year she sold over three
aundred chickens, and hopes to sell six
on NH rad 4 hJa uoor hol1c -
ncrous to count. She lives entirely
alone, there ID not another educated
nerson on the island, aud perhaps we
III not talk! At breakfast. we gossip
ped over "Atiuuts," the new book
;ust published by Harper Il Brothers, |
which accounts ior everything and how
1t came to be go.
At lunch which we took all alone, our !
gull shooter Icing off on a hunt, we sat
we hours sippng our tea out of deli
cate little tea cups over a hundred years
which would drive a China fancier
Wild, and talked of all Miss Bell had
aud hoped yet to do on Harker's
island; dinner at five brought us all to-
gethel again, and we sat till the wee
sma' hours talking, talking, talking.
49, OO,sn1iui OayS Win ner,
got to Morehead just in time for the
twelve O'Clock train on the third day,
md reached home before ''St. Patrici's
lay IN the morning." when the Cotton
Exchange OF Newbern had a jubilee
1ver the sale, this year, of its twenty
bale Of cotton. Newbern
S becoming a great cotton mart and
ooklng up generally in business. At
present we have a boom in newspapers.
IS We row so fast that it takes three
iallles and two weeklies to sustain our
whether the city will r~eciprocate
md sustain this number OF papers is a
problem yet to be solved. The Com
nercial News Company has sold that
PAPER % Mr.. J. W. Harper, of Kinston.
VINO will still carry it on under their
!usplces, while Major Hearne will pubs