Morning journal and courier., 1884-05-28
Educated Flies.

Educated Flies.
 plf2hed Blue-B0ttles.
 IFrom the San Francisco Call
 Making the rounds of the ten-csnt shows on Market street, the reporter found one of the least pratentious of them to be well worth the money invested. It was that of the Educated Flies" The learned pig he had seen. the accomplished canaries he was familiar with and the trained Reas. but edu- catsd flies were something new. On enter ing the little showroom, near Sixth street, there was so little by way of parRphernalia and adornment that the first impression was hardly favorable. But approaching 8 glass showcase the attention is at once riveted upon the performing insects and the longer one looks the mere his interest and wonder grows. ssProf.n Ooughlin, the snowman and l trainer of the accomplished bIue-bottles, stands behind the counter with 8 tiny prod I in his hand, and as he points out the pecu- l iarities and accomplishments of his per l forming pupils, with it occasionally goads l them gently as g stimulus to greater activity. | The first performer exhibited was busily I turning little wooden wheel two and half | inches in diameter. The second drove a l three-stamp mill with such velocity as to l raise each stamp one hundred times g min~ ute. The third performance was with lit l tie ball of cork one-half inch in diameter, l which WAS turneG and handled Cor footed)
 very dsftly. Once, losing his grip, the ball | fell down, but when the Professor" placed | him within reach of it he grabbed in g mo- l ment and went on with his performance, l whirling the little sphere with his feet as l diligently as if he was at work on 8 contract The fourth performer turned little paper | h0Y hQl i aka Ip VI and the fifth g dumb-ball, three-fourths of an inch long, made of csrk. The sixth rode l 8 three-wheeled velocipede, and when guar 1 ter of dollar in silver, which the ''profes- 1 sor'' said was one thousand times the weight of the fly, was placed on the velocipede, it bore the coin gailantlJ on, apparently unim- | psded by the weight. The last and most re- 1 markabla performance was by three flies l One was harnessed with human hair into 8 l little chariot two inches long with four wheels | of brass. Another sat in the drivers velvet covered seat and held the reins of gossamer, l while the third sat at her ease on the back seat and held tiny umbrella which she l turned this way and that as lady coquette l with her parasol. There was one empty l seat which the reporter was invited to take, 1 but for obvious reasons he declined, and the | novel team started on its way without him. In answer to the question what the flies were fed with, the ''professor" answered that he fed them once day only, in the morning. with sugar, meat and beer. They were very l fond of beer, and though they never got dead drunk, they did sometimes get quite lively upon it. There was not more than one fly out of two hundred that would work we'll. There were a good many drones among them and some were serofulous and
 weakly. He had studied flies, he said, for twenty years and read everything he could find on the subject. They were very imita tive. If one let his ball drop while another was performing with his box beside him he would very likely let that fall, too, so quickly that they would both seem to go down to- gether. It took him about a fortnight to train fly. He had tried the common house dy, but had not succeeded well with that. He had found that he could work them about four hours day and they would live about two months. Yes,. good many people came in to see the performances, some two hun dred in day, and they all seem to think it was "fy." Other attractions would be added from time to time.
 Grave Dfggers.
 Robert Louis Stevenson ia Longmans Magazinel
 My acquaintance with grave dlggers, con- sidering it's length vas unremarkable. One, indeed, whom I found plying his spade in the red evening, high above Allan Water, and in the shadow of Dunblane Cathedral, told me of his acquaintance with the birds that still attended on his labors; how some would even perch about him, waiting for their prey; and in a true Sexton's Calendar, how the species varied with the season of the year. But this was the very poetry of the profession. The others whom I knew were somewhat dry. faint flavor of the gar dener hung about them, but sophisticated and disbloomed. They had engagements to oe the seasons, but with mankind's clocks and hour-long measurement of time. And thus there was no leisure for the relishing pinch or the hour long gossip, foot on spade They were men wrapped up in their grim business; they liked well to open long closed family vaults blowing in the key and throwing wide the grating, and they carried in their minds calendar of names and dates. It would be in fifty two" that such tomb was last opened for Miss Jemimy." It was tbus they spoke of their past patients-familiarly but not without respect, like old family ser vants Here is, indeed, servant whom we forgot that we possess who does not wait at the bright table, or run at the bells sum- mons but patiently smokes his pipe beside | the mortuary fire and in his faithful memory | notes the buriaIs of our racs To suspect Shakespeare in his maturity of superficial touch savors of paradox; yet he vas surely in error when he attributed insensibiiity to the digger of the grave. But perhaps it is on Hamlet that the charge should lie; or erhaps-the English sexton differs from the Scotch. ss The goodman deliver" reckoning up his years of office, might at least have suggested other thoughts. It is pride com mon among sextons. A cabinet maker does not count his cabinets, nor even an author his volumes, save when they stare at him from the shelves but the grave digger mum bers his graves. He would indeed be some. thing different from human if his solitary, open-air and tragic labors left not broad mark upon his mind. There, in his tranquil isle, apart from city clamor, among the cata and robins and the ancient efigies and la- gends of the tomb. hs waits the continual passage of his contemporaries, falling like minute drops into eternity. As they fall he counts them ono by one; and this enumera- tion, which was at first perhaps appalling to his soul, in the process of years and by the kindly influence of habit grows to be his pride and pleasure. There are many com mon stories telling how he piques himself on crowded cemeteries. But I will rather tell of the old grave digger of Monkton, to whose unsufering bedside the minister was summoned. He dwelt in 8 cottage built into the wall of the churchyard and through a bulpsey pane above his bs5 he could see, as he lay dying, the rank grasses and the up- right and recunbent stones Dr. Laurie was, I think, 8 moderate; tis certain, at least, that he took 8 very Roman view of death-bed dispositions, for he told the old man that he had lived beyond mans natural years that shis life had been easy and reputable, that his family had all grown up, and that It now be- hooved him unregretfdlly to gird his loins and follow the majority. The grave-digger l heard him out then he raised himself upon one elbow, and with the other hand pointed 1 through the window to the scene of his la- l bors. "Doctor," he said. II hae laid three hdrand and fower-score in that kirk-ya yaird an l it had been his wuli, " indicating heaven, tsI l would ha'e ikit weel to ha'e made out the I flower hunnerD But it was not to be the l tragedian ef ths fifth act had now another | part to pley: and the time had come when | others were to gird and carry him.
 Italian Mortar.
 From the American Architect.l