Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-06-19
THE TOPICAL IALkER.

Heligoland's Peculiar Characteristics-
An Island Hard TO Find.
"DURrNG. my stay in the country" said
Pittsburger yesterday II solved a little
mystery that has perplexed me ever since Wis
tied my relatives there for the first time some
years ago. In the parlor of the house where I
stayed there was really nothing remarkable In
the way of furniture except one object. This
was piece of silver about six inches square,
which rested on a bracket upon the wall. The
silver was a plain spherical disc, with an in
scription in German script and some figures. 1
had not been more than couple Of days in the
house before asked one of my cousins what it
was. The reply was not very satisfying; it was
to the effect that the silver tablet was all they
had to remember Aunt Johanna, who had
passed away before was born.
"But last week by accident learned the COM
plete history of that piece of silver. When my
Aunt Johanna died, her surviving family gave
her an elegant funeral; the most stylish turn
out of the kind the people thereabouts had ever
seen. Her coffin was of the most expensive
kind, and large silver plate engraved with a
miniature biography of the good lady was or
dered to be affixed thereto. But when the
funeral time came it appeared to Aunt Johan-
mas heirs nothing less than sinful waste to let
that coffin plate be put where nobody could see
parlor ornament of it. 1t is new idea, of
course, but it has more than mere novelty to
recommend it,
THERE is joke concealed in the pretty little
gobbling arrangement to which England
and Germany are parties. In addition to giving
away territory in Africa that is not hers to give.
England cedes to Germany the island of Helig-
GLAND, in the North Sea. Heligoland is the
joke.
Some of the English Liberal papers do not
appear to see the joke They denounce Lord
Salisbury for giving up English ground to Ger
many, and the Chronicle declares that by his
concessions to Germany Lord Salisbury has
fixed on the brow Of the imperial Unionist
party an indelible brand of ignomny. which
gives the cue to other powers to demand SINH
lar concessions. 1t adds: "Unless Parliament
stops the Governments headlong career Of
capitulation to Germany there is no reason
why Italy should allow US to keep Malta, or
Spain Gibraltar"
Probably in day or two everybody but Ger
many, perhaps. will understand Lord Sails
pury's pleasantly.
TRAVELLERS from this country on board the
steamers which ply between New York
and Hamburg usually get glimpse of Heligo-
land as they near the mouth of the Elbe and
the port of Hamburg. 1t does not stand out
very plainly, but in daylight its red cliffs and
dazzling white sands make up in color for what
the island lacks in size. 1t is very little more
than mile long and a third Of a mile wide at
its widest part. A part of what is included in
Heligoland is sandbank that is gradually dis
appearing before the onset of the sea.
The island proper has population probably
ofs $500, and in summer time the good burghers
of Hamburg come with their wives, SO that in
July and August the regular population is
doubled. In fact if it were not for the good
bathing and cool sea breezes in midsummer,
Heligoand would have been abandoned to the
North Sea before this.
II ELIaoLAND is inhabited all the year round
by fisher folk, and the men who do not earn
precarious livings in the fisheries are pilots.
The wind-swept fields afford pasture for
few sheep, who are tied up as q COW is tied up
here in an orchard or upon some favored lawn.
If the sheep were not anchored they would be
blown away, fall over the cliffs. or, worse still,
pillage the potato fields upon which the island
ers depend for food. There is no room in the
island for horses; the last one was crowded out
years ago. The land is titled by hand, and the
only vehicles in use are wheelbarrows and in
valids' chairs.
During the summer season a COW. sometimes
two COWS are imported for the use of the
visitors. The COW or cows return to the main
land of Germany in the fall. They would
starve if they stayed on the island 1t is hardly
necessary to add that Heligoland possesses no
trade. She has nothing to sell but what a real
estate man once called "a choice location and
lots of air." She can only sell these COM
modities to limited number.
=
POLITICALLY speaking, Heligoland has not
been of very much account since ante
Christian times. In those days an immense
temple to the goddess Hertha attracted the
Angles from the mainland, as the sea-bathing
and the air draw the Hamburgers to-day. But
conversion to Christianity was too much for
the Heligolanders and they failed to figure
prominently during the dark ages except as
semi pirates and very independent citizens
generally. In fact for some centuries after
Heligoland became the nominal property OF
the Dukes of Scbleswig and Hostein 1t was a
pretty hard thing to say at any given moment
who the owner of the little island was. Their
Graces, the Dukes aforesaid, had cheerful
habit Of pawning Heligoland for loans nego-
tiated in the prosperous free city OF Hamburg.
So nobody could be sure about the ownership
of Heligoland without looking over the books
OF the paWnprOkefs III bnos AuStJ Sby oh VIC
Ebbe.
When England absorbed 1t in one Of her fits
of abstraction in 1907 it happened to belong to
Denmark. In the settlement Of 1914, when
every European power took as much Of his
nelghbor's territory as he could, England
ceded Heligoland to herself She has kept 1t
ever since; why, nobody knows, except that 1t
really was no particular use to anybody. 1t is
practically German settlement. The Frisian
| tongue prevails on the island; the people are
| all sprung from German stocks. Engands
rule has consisted in letting the Heligolanders
do as they please. They have paid very small
taxes, and the English Governor has usually
been person exiled for diplomatic reasons.
| and, therefore. one who did not love Heligo-
land too well. How the Heligolanders will like
the German military service which they will
| now have to experience, is a question that
| Germany and England can afford to ignore.
AS a cession of territory, Englands gift to
Germany strikes me as joke.
PEOPLE OF PROMINENCE.