Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1884-11-13

winter sleep, as thefe IS eFluenCe 10 SLOW
| that it is also the cause of that temporary
starvation of brain which lulls without ar
resting its action, in the natural repose of
each night. We may even regard the leth-
argy, ended by death, into which man falls
when exposed to great cold as short and
mortal nation.-British Medical JOM-
nal.
PRESIDENTS WIVES.
The misfortunes of women who have been
the wives Of our later presidents is remark
able. Mrs. Harrison, Mrs Taylor, Mrs.
Lincoln and Mrs. Garfield all became wild
ows while at the White House, the two last
under the most terrible becircumstances. The
first Mrs Tyler died while her husband was
President and the second Mrs. Tyler, who is
now living at Georgetown, d. c., was com
| PEELED to ask Congress for pension in 1879.
| Ex-President John Tyler diedat Richmond
in January, 1862, and his property was de-
stroyed by the war. Mrs. James K. Polk,
who is yet living at Nashville at the adj
vanced age of eighty-four, had fortune
left her and has long enjoyed the society of
rare circle of devoted friends, but the last
days of her life have been much embittered
| by the disgraceful defalcation and subse-
quent imprisonment Of her nephew, who
was State Treasurer of Tennessee. Mrs.
Tyler and Mrs. Polk are the only women
now living who were wives Of ante-bellum
Presidents, and it is rather odd that Mrs.
| Tyler is the younger of the two by twenty
five or thirty years, whereas her husband
was President in 1S43 and 1874, while Mr..
Polk did not come into the office till later.
Mrs. Tyler was not only a second wife, but
married at the early age of eighteen. She
had the honor of giving wedding recep-
tion at the White House. There are at least
two people in New York who danced at
that reception-Mr. Henry Bergh and wife.
I shall not attempt to recount the misfor-
tunes of Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Garfield, for
they are known all over the world. Poor
Mrs. Lincoln survived her husband a dozen
years or more, but she never survived the
shock that his death gave her, and the lat
ter days Of her life were clouded by diSor-
dered mind. Few and far between were
the happy moments that fell to her lot from
the turbulent hour that her husband be-
came President. The story Of Mrs. Andrew
johnson is almost as pathetic, but it is not
so well known. She was nearly sixty years
old when her husband became President,
and had been married over forty years. She
was almost as little known at Washington
during the Presidential career of Andrew
| Johnson as if she had not lived at all, and
! the American people know less about her
than of the wives Of any Of the Chief Exec
| utives of their country. She died in 1876,
six months after her husband had died. l
do not suppose Mrs. Grant is by any means
happy woman, though she has the salts
| faction of knowing that the American peo-
pie will always hold her husband in the
| highest esteem for his great military SER
! vices. The disaster that came upon Gen.
| Grant and her sons who were in business in
| the firm of Grant g. Ward told very heavily
upon her and she, along with the other re-
cent Presidents wives, has a burden to bear.
! Mrs. Hayes seems to be peacefully settled in
| life, and lives quietly at little village in
Ohio.-Ben. Perley Poore.
ANTIQUITY OF NOtWith-
standing the obscurity that surrounds the be-
ginnings of agriculture in different regions
it is settled that the dates vary exceeding
| ly. One of the earliest examples of culti-
vated plants is drawn from Egypt, in the
shape of Il design representing tigs in one
of the pyramids Of GiZeh. The date OF the
construction Of the monument is uncertain;
hundred to four thousand two hundred
years before Christ. If we assign it to two
! thousand years before Christ we would have
an antiquity of four thousand years for the
fig. Now the pyramids can have been con-
Structed only by a numerous people, organ
| lied and civilized to certain degree, who
must consequently have an established ag-
riculture, going back several centuries, at
least, for it's origin. In China, tWenty-sev-
en- hundred years before Christ, the Empe-
ror Chennung introduced Il ceremony in
plants were soWn, viz: rice, SOFA, wheat,
and two kinds Of millet. These plants
must have been cultivated for some length
of time in some places to have attracted the
attention of the emperor at that period.
Agriculture seems, then, to have been as
ancient in China as in Egypt. The con-
slant intercourse of the latter country with
Mesopotamia justifies us in presuming that
cultivation was almost cOntemporaneous in
the regions Of the Euphrates and the Nile
| Why may it not have been quite as ancient
in India and the Indian Archipelago? The
history OF the Dravidian and Malaysian peo-
pie does not 90 back very far, and is very
obscure; but there is no reason for presum-
ing that cultivation, particularly on the
banks of the river, did not begin among
them very long time ago.-Poputar Sci-
ence Monthly.
How TO MEsMER1zE-Dr. Baird thus
describes the operation ofmesmerism: With
one hand bright object, such as faceted
piece of glass, is held thus, eight or twelve
inches from the subject, so that there is
considerable cOnvergence Of the eyes, and
rather above the level of the eyes, so that
that he is obliged to look upward. The
subject is told to look steadily at the
piece of glass, and to keep his whole at
tention fixed upon it. This position is kept
for five or ten minutes; during this time
the pupils will probably dilate considerably,
often assuming a slight rhythmic contraction
and dilation when this is the case the free
hand is moved slowly from the object to-
ward the eyes. If the subject is sensitive,
the eyes will usually close with vibratory
motion. In some cases the subject is then
unable to open them, and the usual meslne-
ric phenomena can be obtained. If, when
the operator brings his hand near the eyes
of the subject, the subject instead of closing
them follows the movements of the fingers,
the whole proceeding is repeated, but the
subject is told to close his eyes when the
fingers are brought near them, but to keep
them fixed in the same direction us before,
and to continue to think of the object and
that only. The operator then, for some
minutes, makes "passes," bringing his warm
hands over and close to the face of the SUBJ
iect in one direction. When the subject is
inclined to pass into the cataleptic state, an
indication of his condition may be obtained
by gently raising his arm; if he is begin
ming to be mesmerized the arm remains in
the position in which it is placed. If the
arm falls, the mesmeric state may not in
frequently be hastened on by telling the
subject to keep his arm extended while he
is still gazing at the object, or while the
passes are being made. And that is the
whole of the process The man thus mes
merized sinks from manhood to a highly