The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1896-01-24


CaIssns 1aass.l RatA Vhich OhH.,..a
IN WAlee.
The principality Of Wales has within
living memory possessed An Official
known AZ the .ssin-eater." 1t was tn.
practice for . relative-usually q won
an-to put on the breast OF q deceased
person 2 quantity Of bread aud cheese
and beer, and the sin-eater was sent, for
to consume them and to pronounce the
everlasting rest Of the departed. twas
believed that in doing this he absolutely
ate and appropriated to himself the sins
symbolized by the viands, and thereby
prevented their disturbing the repose Of
b sinner who had committed them.
such an arrangement would obviously
leave nothing to be desired on the II
side, but how it worked on the other we
are not told. What was supposed to be
tAi1a1nf 5dion OF this spiritual UNDER
tai frassr the ceremony was con-
eli Did his appropriation" Of the
de- MS sins imply a sort of moral as
stn ION OF them, answering to his
ply Cal assimilation of the bread and
cheese? The question would obviously
be one of some Importance to a sin-eater
in large practice. If the. responsible
ties OF his profession were as great az
ties of his profession were as great as
hypothesis, he would need to retire
from it early, and to devote a consider
able portion of his closing years to re-
pentance and good works.
Again, it is natural to ask what hap
pened at the decease of a popular or
fashionable" sin-eater. Would any,
n among his professional brethren
undertake to eat his sins, even in the
first flush of satisfaction produced by|
stepping into his shoes? If so, then,
indeed, has the epithet of gallant"
been rightly bestowed upon little Wales.
1t is as though n doctor s%ucceedingt to
another's practice should consent to as
sumo the moral responsibility for his
late colleagues treatment of all his de-
ceased patients, in addition to his own
similar burdens.
We yield to none in admiration of the
quiet and homely heroism of the medi-
cal profession, but we doubt whether it
would enable them to face such an or
deal as this. AS to the Welsh practi-
tioners to whom we have compared
them, we shrink from pursuing the an
alysis further. It is evident that, as in
the schoolboy game of 'conquerors,"
where a stone which can smash the
smasher, of, say, 43 other stones takes
over all its conquests, and becomes it. |
self a "forty-fourer," so the responsible
tiles of these unhappy men might ac-
cumulate at an alarming rate. One
hardly dares to contemplate the inter-
nal condition of the sin-eater who had in
life attended a long series of other sim
eaters. The cheese would be almost
converted into Welsh rabbit before he |
had got it down.-London Times.
The wheat yield in the Genesee
valley, Idaho, this seasons immense. w.
n. Glib thrashed 1000 bushels off of 200
acres, averaging about As bushels tothe
acre. Dan Healy cut and thrashed IA
acres Of wheat that went 50 bushels to
the acre.
A Missouri rattlesnake at the mu-|
scum of comparative zoology at Cam
bridge has been observed to lose his
skin twice a year and to add a rattle
for every skin. Instead of losing the
rattles as he does the skin, they are rel
tanned by the closing of the inner end
of the old rattle over the knob of the
new one, and accidents accepted, the
snake bears with him this record of his
age.
The trade in California sweet wines
is showing a gratifying increase. The
total estimated product for this year is
10000 gallons, which is rs per cent.
more than was marketed last year.
Heretofore there has been little profit
in the vintages because of the fierce com
petition of growers, but the producers
! have now made arrangements with a
sweet-wine syndicate which will con-
troll the entire product of the state and
give all concerned some share in the
profit.
in America it has been observed
TT bees often bore tubular corollas in
Pier to get at the nectar of flowers, in
u atad of entering by the mouth, as
S1A~nblebees do in Europe. In essayson
p M3 crossfertilization of flowers, this
al,osed anomaly has been the subject
AAppuch comment. 1t nowappearst that
the humblebees of Europe and America
49,, 7on+;col habits in regard to the