Birmingham age-herald., 1894-10-18
THE LAND OF SLEEP.
somnolent Effects of Northern
 New York Hop Fields.
wayfarers and Natives succumb to the Drowsy Infiuence-1all Stories
 Told About This 7Pecul- ..5Sss far Region. #

Tn the mellow, misty days of autumn wayfaring strangers in either Otsego or Schohalie county are certain to be overcome by q surprising drowsiness which commonly n1alSes them think that they have been drugged in some unaccountablet fashion. But when these dozing travellers observe that this apparently uncomfortable desire to slumber weights the lids of natives as well as their own, the ramblers at- tribute their sofnno1e1ice to some un- known soporific quality in the prevail ing haze. That, says writer in New York exchange, is about as far as they ever penetrate the phenomena. If journeying on horseback or in wagons they are soon snoringss while if they are travelling on Shanl,s' mare they drop along the roadside and fall fast asleep. No matter how wide awake they may be, they arc powerless to re- sist the drowsiness when they enter either of these counties.
 The same thing prevails in that part of the D. & II. railroad which cuts through Scheharie and Otsego coun- ties. Conductor Jim Thomas, and all the train hands for that matter, have to use. drugs to keep from falling asleep while they are in this torpescent region. All tho passengers sleep like dormice. There they sit, pipe in mouth. at card tables and paper in hand, as if suddenly struck dead But their snores proclaim that they are only benufnbed by sleep.
 flra .<,l,4 +1.,,1- +l,, +I,oeo e1,,,, 1,o,-- ing passengers would be ''soft marks for a train robber, but ex-Assembly- man o. F. Lane, of Otsego, tells story which proves exactly the reverse. A thief did clean out the pockets of some twenty passengers. But when, after passing outside the counties, the pas sengers came to, they found the luck less thief, loaded with booty, stretched snoring in a corner. He had got with ip step of the door when the sleep fever hit him and he fell snoring in his tracks.
 With all the trouble Conductor Thomas has prodding slumbering way passengers into partial valentines, his friends wonder that every hair in his head hasn't turned white. Still, at this season these counties are an Acadia to which flock many persons suffering with insomnia.
 It cures, but the cure is even worse than the disease At least that is what w. H. Bunn, appraiser of the port of Oswego, thinks. Hard work aggra. vated by too many warm bottles and cold birds, left Mir. Bum martyr to f.sa 1ac r1,f relief in CobleskiH, Schoharie county. Even before he got settled there he bet came dead to all surroundings. No one, not even himself, knows how long he slept Some. say forty-nine hours right off the reel. Anyway. after week of it he went home cured. But he became such sleepyhead that he is said to be seeking something that will bring on a mild form of insomnia.
 Ex-Congressnaan Pendar tells story of a stump speaker in Schenevus, Ot- sego county, who fell dead asleep right in the middle of his soration. He was struck with one hand aloft like pump handle. In that preposterous attitude and still snoozing he was carried to the nearest tavern. The political cam paign was over before he became wide awake --r---.--.s--.s----
 Every one, scientific or otherwise, who has investigated the matter agrees that the drowsiness which becomes epidemic in this region every fall is caused by the intoxicating aroma from the hop fields, which, with the almost inpalpable yellow dust blown from the hops, gluts the atmosphere. Hop pill lows have long been recognized as 8 sovereign cure for sleeplessness. Yet if the stuffing of a million hop bolsters were scattered to the winds they could not as richly impregnate the. air as do