Barbour County index., 1884-02-22
A Few Fririd Facts


III there is one thing more than an
other that the country necds-that it alb
solutely yearns fort is a law abolish
ing the temperature crank and his ten
cent thermometer. Both are nuisances
in the fullest meaning of the term, and
a long-suffering people are, Just at this
time, losing their temper and their con-
fidence in the wisdom of an all-wise
Providence under this double inflicsion
The man with the ten-ccnt thermome-
ter IS far superior, in point of bore-you-
to-deathativeness, to the fellow who asks
If this is cold enough for you The latter
is merely seeking information, and YOU
are at liberty to either answer him or
turn the remains over to the coroner;
but the thermometer fiend isn't seek
er after knowledge; he is loaded to the
muzzle already, and only seeks a victim
with whom he can divide. 1t is useless
to tell him that his ten-cent, mercury
loaded, bottle-glass and tin back weather
prevaricator is a snare and a delusion:
that it doesn't know anything about
temperature. lie has the utmost faith
IN the accuracy of his instrument and
will accept its statements in the face of
contradiction by all the high-priced aud
high-toned Thermometers in the coun-
try. If he finds that she shows thirty
seven degrees below zero, he orders an
other ton of coal and puts on four more
suits of underclothes though the bows
be playing marbles in the alleys, the
streets knee-deep in mud and the
man in the next yard is spading up
ground for his next springs garden.
There is no denying the fact that
the ten-cent thermometer is great at
getting down to its work 1t can
make mans hair stand on end and
send the shivers scooting down his
spinal column without half trying
that is, if you are foolish enough tc
place any confidence in the showing il
makes. 1t can go down to forty-two
below zero on the plcssantest of Wyo-
ming afternoons, and stay there, ''with-
out turning hair" as the horse re-
porter says. 1t can show tempera-
ture calculated to freeze the nasal or
gan of the face of the bronze dogo on the
front stoop of the Mayors residence,
and stare you in the face with Ge )rge
Washington stare, while you wine the
perspiration from your face and long
for linen duster and fan.
WHICH tue Ben-CeuG thermometer \
owner is obliged by feminine persua-
sion to get up and light the fire. he
looks at his tin weather ind Gator and
finds it registering seventy-tive below
zero and still going down. He goes
down town and makes affidavit before
every man he meets that it is seventy
five below, LecauSe his thermometer
said so. He enlarges upon the supe-
rior excellence of his thermometer,
which can, when the weather permits,
register all the way down to one hun
dred below zero, while the ordinary in
struments freeze up somewhere about
tie forty notch. The average cheap
thermometer is about as reliable as a
gas-meter, or a politicians promise,
and its workings as uncertain as the
verdict of jury. Hence we say that if
some genius VIII suggest some plan by
which the evil instrument and all 0a-
levers in it can be swept from the face
of the earth into the waste basket of a
chaotic eternity, a grateful people will
rise up and ask him to take something.
The BOOnlerd11.