The islander. [volume] (Friday Harbor, Wash.) 1891-1899, 1895-02-28
THINGS YOU CAN BUY.
ALIST OF ARTICLES NOT GENERALLY
CONSIDERED MERCHANTABLE.

Time and Water For Sale In New York
Electricity and Power Are Daily Bought,
and a View Has Value In Real Estate.
People Who Sell Their Dead Bodies.
In New York, as in other great cities,
where the fight for life is fiercest, there
is price for erything-even under
certain conditions for the very air we
breathe Father Time himself is on sale.
The Western Union Telegraph company
has desks in the national observatory
in Washington Four minutes before
noon the wires of the system all over
the United States are cleared Of bust
ness, and the instant the sun passes the
seventy fifth meridian electricity car
ries the news to every city. The time
ball falls in New York at noon, in Chi
cago at | a. m in Omaha at 10 a. m.
and in San Francisco at 9 a. NJ, in
simultaneous obedience to that single
click from the instrument at Washing
ton.
In all the large cities the Western
Union has supplied business houses,
banks and offices with electric clocks
that respond obediently to the daily
mandate. Each of these rents for $15
per year, and in New York alone over
5000 have been put up. Last years
revenue to the telegraph company from
the sale of time approximated 81, 500, =
900.
Water is sold regularly to the ships
in the harbor, and the water boats, !"
with big tanks on board, are familiar
objects to all yachtsmen. Brooklynites
will recall the discomfort incident to
the breaking of big main not long
since, and the people of Newark cannot
forget the annoyance and cost of their
experience three years ago. The supply
from the Passaic was like mud soup,
and for the time being the owners Of
an artesian we'll in the Oranges did a
large trade in water. The householders
of Roseville and those even farther
down town watched for the morning
water carts more eagerly than ever a
milkman was awaited and saw sui
fioient quantity for the day provided be-
fore taking train for New York.
Ordinarily there is no sale for air;
but, like water when a man wants it
be wants it mighty bad" This for
awhile was the case at Libby prison,
where, before the prisoners organized
sort of government Of their own, it was
customary for the stronger men to get
as near the windows as they dared and
then sell their places to weaker COM
rades who We're gasping for breath. Fire,
of course, in the form of various COM
bustibles is a recognized commodity.
One frequently hears of those who
suffer from strange and incurable dis
eases and who make comfortable their
last days by selling their bodies to the
surgeons for dissection.
At church and other sorts of fairs
kisses may sometimes be purchased, the
tariff varying according to the purse of
the kisser Or the charms of the kissee.
Reduced gentlewomen often derive reve-
nue. by chaperoning and introducing to
good society the daughters of the newly
rich. Invitations to select balls occa-
sionally represent large outlay. and
it probably costs as much to get into the
swell set as it does to gain a seat in
congress. The social aspirant makes
presents, while the political is Gas
sessed :"
Relics, sacred, profane and CHASTITY,
have their price. Autographs of famous
people are always in demand, and bit
of the rope with which murderer has
been hanged is valued by gamblers and
the superstitious. In Paris it is custom
airy, once a year, to sell at auction the
personal effects of those who have been
executed, and this always attracts a
| large crowd of purchasers. Locks of
hair from the heads of noted beauties or
| celebrated men are marketable.
Charms, including, of course, the
| rabbits foot, dear to the African heart,
bring revenue to their cunning devisers,
and astrologers and fortune tellers have
clientele respectable in numbers.
Lucky stones and madstones are priced
by those who believe in their virtues.
Consumptives often pay for the priv
ilege of drinking fresh blood as it pours
| from the necks of butchered animals at
| the slaughter house, hoping that the
| sanguine draft may stay the ravages of
| disease. The big hotels in New York
and elsewhere derive some income from
the sale of unspoiled scraps of food to
the keepers of cheap restaurants. and
thus the latter are able to serve their
patrons with large bowls of stew at a
maximum price of 10 cents.
On the east side of this city several
people exc out scanty living by writ
| ing letters for the illiterate. Even the
four leaved clover may be turned into
| coin. A big business is done in selling
electricity and steam power, while many
a man in New York is paying high
price for sunlight. A view" adds ma
terially to the value of house.