The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-06-29
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

in the report presented by the Suez
Canal Company the directors ask for a
vote of quarter of million of francs for
a statue of Ferdinand de LesSeps to be
erected at Port Said. The number of ships
passing through the canal during the year
has been 3,4O9, of these 3,211 passed through
by night. The average transit was about
sixteen hours. Small schools for the in
struction of the children of the company's
employees have been established at each
station, but there has been an epidemic
of ophthalmia which has been a serious
hindrance to the schools.
"A parliamentary "blue book on Crete
has just been published. The most inn
portant dispatch is that of Col. Cherm-
side, in command of the British and Ital-
ian troops at Gambia, He says: 1T is
the opinion of many well versed in Cretan
affairs that displacement, by emigration,
of the Muslin inhabitants must inevitably
follow the establishment of the Christian
political and administrative ascendency in
the island. Certain classes, such as petty
ocials, non-Cretan Muslins, townspeople
without property, etc, will certainly dis
appear"
1t is not generally known" says the
Philadelphia Record, that the United
States minis make money for other ma
lions as well as for our own. The mint
in this city, which has just finished MAX
ing $4,000 in So gold pieces for costa
Rica, has begun work on 100000 silver dol
lars for San Domingo. The designs on the
coins are often ideas of the governments
which send the orders, and are got up in
such way as to make limitations as diff
ficult as possible for the counterfeiter.
The coin is shipped in bags to New York,
where 1t is carried to its destination on
Inr. 1sraa rtan ,r,r.A
given by the mint as to the amount of
precious metal used is never questioned
by the foreigners.
municipalities I'm Nebraska may now
adopt the initiative and referendum if
they so desire. and Omaha will soon take
a vote on the question, says the New
York Tribune. If the rule is adopted, Is
per cent. of the voters may thereafter by
petition propose ordinances, and 20 per
cent of the voters may compel the city
government to submit proposed ordinances
to vote of the people. So much for the
initiative. The referendum provisions are
that ordinances passed by the city council
shall not go into effect for thirty days,
and if in the mean time 5 per cent. of the
voters petition for the submission of any
ordinance to popular vote the same shall
be submitted, and must be approved by
majority to come into effect. If 10 per
cent. of the voters petition, then the ordi-
nance shall be submitted at a special
election held within twenty days. Ordi-
nances relating to the immediate preserv-
alton of the public peace and health, and
items of appropriation for current ex-
penses not in excess of those made the
previous year. are excepted from the ref
erendum rule.
"A woman cannot sell shoes to other
women said a prominent shoe dealer the
other day, according to the New York
Commercial Advertiser. Strange as it
may appear, women will make their Sc
lections and purchases from male clerks
every time, and it is for this reason that
so few shoe dealers employ women clerks.
While women will buy shoes from male
clerks they would not think of buying
stockings from them. It S not only in this,
but in all other cities in this country that
this is true Now in Europe it is some.
what the other way, and in many of the
larger shoe establishments there are more
women clerks than men clerks, and Wo-
men customers prefer the women clerks
nearly every time, except in the case when
the purchasers are American. They pre-
fer to deal with the men clerks. In buy
ing shoes, women are much more conf
dental than men are. A man-that is, the
great run of men-doesn't care so much
for looks as he does for comfort and fit.
With women this is reversed. They make
comfort and fit secondary TO the matter
of looks. Somehow women think that the
man clerk has better Judgment in the
| matter of looks than any woman clerk
has or could have There is no use trying
I to argue the question even if there was
any room for argument. Dealers have 90
recognize the fact and be governed by 1t.
have never had a woman to ask me
why did not employ women clerks, while
/ I l. L. H.. l.. -
| question. Now, while men will ask that
and similar questions, there is not one in
one hundred who would buy their shoes
| from a woman clerk, if we had them.
| suppose it is the laws of trade which reg
| ulate such matters. Certain il is that
| don't know anything of the causes though
| / have been selling shoes for over thirty
| five years. 1t Is to be presumed that
would have learned something in that
time about it, but l confess l have not"
Whether or not the customs authorities
Of American ports are in earnest in their
attempts to suppress bribery, the sad
fact is that il goes on, though by no
means to the extent commonly supposed,
says Robert Lues in Going Abroad. II
goes on, and public opinion does not sup
press II. To dodge taxes and 70 bride
custom house officials to deceive the as
| SCISSOR and the inspector are venial sins
in the eyes of many people who would
not cheat their neighbors nor steal
cent. When public opinion does not frown
! on public practice, however sinful or
criminal that practice may be. it is hypo-
critical in a writer to content himself
with an abstract denunciaton of It, Let
me leave the right and wrong of the
thing to the moralist and take the more
practical course of pointing out the folly
of ii. To the fashionable woman who
tries to smuggle in a thousand dollars
worth of lace 1 have nothing to say
To the man who sews diamonds in his
clothes l have nothing to say. My advice
will be solely to the traveller who brings
home with him a reasonable amount
of clothing and the ordinary mementos
and bric-a-brac one picks up In foreign
tour. Such person waists every cent he
gets stealthily into the hands Of an in
spector. Uncle Sam is not petty and in
quisitorial In this matter. He seeks to
tax only those who make large purchases
abroad. 1t would not do for him 10 say
In so many words that you can bring I'm
pack of playing cards but not two
packs nor ten packs nor hundred packs
But he isn't gOiun a turn vottr ffttptr ~,