The Penn's Grove record., 1889-08-17
Washington Letter.

washington, ~. y. Aug. 10, 1905.
The census OF 1870 wdS taken by the
United States marshals under the direc-
ton of a superintendent, who worked
under the Secretary of the Interior.
As the marshals we're employees of the
department of Justice, the confusion
was very great. The act Of 1879, which
governed the census taking OF 1850,
aud will with Il few notifications apply
to that OF 1890 vas properly the work
of James A. Garfield, Representative
). S. Cox, General Francis A. Walker
and Eugene Ha.e. 1t provides for the
centering of the work at Washington
and the enumeratiWIs by persons who
are solely appointed, except the super
visors, by the superintendent of the
census
The house to house count will CON-
mence Oh he first Monday Of next June,
and will involve inquiries as 10 age,
sex, nativity, race, physical condition,
and a dozen other things. Forty thou
sand enumerations will be in the 175
census districts and fOI each of these
districts the President will in February
appoint "a supervisor, who will receive
$125 per month and in addition thereto
100 for every 1000 of the population
in thickly settled districts and LAO in
others. The eDumeratiOns will be paid
two cents for every inhabitant, birth
and death reported; twenty cents for
each farm and thirty cents for each
factory recorded, and for every veteran
of the late war five cents. In addition
to these out door employees there are
many special agencies which are very
coy places for the friends of statesmen,
involving little labor and no expendi-
ture of ideas, the duties being merely to
go to manufacturing establishments in
cities and ask pointed questions and
put down the answer.
The amount of inlorma, ion obtained
and the number of subjects treated III
our census are amazing. . Every field is
covered. Great Britain sends II police
nan around in the evening to each
house with il printed slip asking infor-
nation and in The morning he carries
IT away, and the thing is done Is t III
this county census taking is invoicing
everything on hand. The work of the
Tenth Census was embraced IA twenty
two volumes, and some of those were
not issued until 1887. The work bid
fair To last forever. There was even Il
volume devoted to forest trees and two
volumes of long winded essays on social
subjects. 1t was a dumping place Tor
waste information. The new census
wall attempt to be less ambitious,
though the projectors OF the census ol
1880 made the same promise.
e,, "a, -, Ia. .Ss..lnr - unconditional
tut Porter's Offices OH Saturday the
verltable original census office clerk, at
least lie was 81 considered When the
census of 1870 was made, and l would
NOT be superseded ~ learn that sleci-
'llehs OF his youthful penmanship ar- to
lie found IN the musty records OF The
census OF 1890, still preserved i'll tie
interior department. In 1870 he was
hi i in office by Henry Wilson, and in
1870 10y Senator Hoar. He was pronpL-
iy discharged at about the fist general
led action Of clerks after tie taking of
each GenSus, aud was never seeD until
the II vt me WAS announced. On sat
urday lie seemed as clipper as ever,
asked NE ion ON chewing tobacco and
WAS surprised to learn That | did net
Use the stuff, informed mt mysteriously
that he "had Porter down fine" dor
rowed" ten cents, and d;ifted away,
poor old wreck.
When the d All who wants To kno y
goes 10 the Weather Bureau to find out,
and succeeds in i~nterIupting The inter
minable fight that is in progress be
tween tbs Army officers and the civil
alleged experts OF that office long enough
Ia get All interview, he finds u at Ie
has had his labor for his pains. The
other day | asked one Of Prof. Cleve-
land Abie's assistants for his theory
as to the causes of the heavy rains since
April l. II will give you the Ggures,'
he gracefully replied, and his face grew
serious ''of course, the occasion for
every phenomenal precipitation is not
certainly known, YET | may say in gen.
eral of this case at least, that these re-
cent pr, cip.tati0us Of rain have been
due to the fact that the conditions for
such rainlalis have been astOnishingly
favorable" And then The poor blum
derer who i, paid $1,000 for beiogging
himself and i"s ng himself Up in thor
aGyhfares ol words, beamed upon me
in delighted surprIs al his W wisdom.
ST., in other words. regardless of expen-
sc, The Signal Service announces that
it has rained more than usual because
il has been easier for it-to fall than it
was, say last year. You a procure
all the figures you want at the Signal
Office rainfall, temperature, barometer
readings,-anything but theories for
~forecasting the weather or eyading
calamaties from storms,