The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1899-12-27
BILL ARP ON LECTURE TOUR.
OBSERVATIONS DURING a TRIP.
Tho Difference Between Large and
Small Ciiies-He is Astonisbed at
the Growth Some Places

ONNS nv" oAiOuio hahC lllNlS
TO brighten up the year at its close.
And so my wife-th oughtful woman
told me that | had better start OUT
aud see If | couldent talk the good peo-
pie out OF enough to make the grand
children happy. The weather WAS un-
propitious and my old bones were
grumbling, but | obeyed the maternal
orders and went Inertia is great in.
vent'on. The Older We grow the more
Inertia we have. When ! have STAYED
at home few months, | want to keep
on staying there ard 1T nearly kills me
to rouse up aud go away for even a
week. After have gotten on the roa1
the harness seems to warm me up, my
Inertia ls broken and new scores ana |
p' op'e and friends absorb my atten-
tion.
| have just returned from Alabama |
from u second trip and the welcome |
home has settled ME down 90 ca! IN and |
serene that my inertia has began 10 |
work and feel like | could never go |
away any more. The weather was
against me somewhat, but | reckon !
sold enough talk to run Ut through This
Christmas | hope 50, for 1t may be
the last and then What then?
: mere Is wonderful difference be.
tween the people Of big cities and
those OF little unprpterding towus. By
request visited Childersburg, a vii.
lage OF q few hundred people, whom
did not find too busy to talk 10 me
especially the old Confederate vete-
rams, whose grizzly beard and settled
features always mark them. | can tell
them hundred yards off. Aod the
common people heard him gladly"
sayeth the scriptures. Just so have |
found tho Of
Southland ere my most willing hearers.
| love them aud love TO talk to them,
for they have neither policy DCr hypo-
crsy. | an glad myscif TO belong to
TO the middle class Rud to mipgiG with
them. Arlstocratic society has but
| few charms for me. The weeteet poet
| who ever wrote u verse said that Ablu
| Ben Ah6am WAS placed high in heaven
becs use he loved his follow men. That
was his only crcdential.
| In Childersburg the good people
gathered at the academy that cost
nothing. In fact not anything cost
anything, and [ was most Hospitality
| entertained and left with o kiss on the
lips OF u sweet little girl who recited q
spt cch for me that her aunt had taught
her. She was only a little child. Be-
fore left home ! had = letter from q
cousin in Birmingh ham cordially invit-
ing me to his house, and sad he would
meet me ct the depot with brass
brand. Also another letter from lady
friend, a widow, who said | must come
to her house and she would meet me
ct the depot with open arms. When
my wife read them | asked where
| had better go, and ste replied With
peculiar emphasis, "g) to Fred's.'
Birmingham Is wonderful city and
a very beautiful one. a large. clo ar,
well arranged depot receives you
Broad, well paved streets and side.
walks delight you, and magniliUent
commercial blocks astonish you. Every
thing has been planned on grand
scale aud everybody is busy with trade
and industries that seem to be incress.
ing and spreading out in every direc-
| tlon. thousands OF beautiful dw ellings
adorn the highland; that environ the
city aud hIndreds are being built on
new streets that are being graded and
paved as fast as it Is possible. There
are churches ttern that cost over
100000 each. Moncy, money, money .
IL 's there by the million and keeps Oa
coming from all points Of the country
for investment. Wealthy merchants
from other cities have planted branch
houses there and the child is OuLgrow-
ing the parent Ali around this center
the whole Sace OF the earth Is dotted
with iron plants and their fires are
ever burning. 1t is nagE ticent sight
TO approach birmingham by night and
on either side OF every railroad to sec
the angry loo- ing flames going up from
thousands Of coke ovens aud hundreds
| OF smoke stacks: 1t makcs one think
OF Dantn's Inferno aud Hades anu Pluto
and Hell itself. Mt very long ago d
tramp wandered out among the ovens
| before they were fired and laid down
TO sleep. Daring the night, when the
tires were ali aslow, he was found in
dangerous proximity and was rudely
punched up, and when asked who he
WAS and where he came from, said :
" was in birmingham yesterday ara
reckon got drunk and | suppose l
| am In hell now-just as I've been eX-
| pectlDe--no water about here Is
| there ?"
visited Ensley, the Southern Pitts
burg, where the leviathan steel plants
are going up. There is population
now OF $1,000 busy people operating the
furnaces and rolling mills and mining
FOR coal, out the helf has not been told
and I'm afraid to tell what think |
was told about the plants that are 90
Ing up and are under contract to be
CohPletcu ana In operation by lSt OF
April next. Hundreds of handsome
cottages, all neatly finished and paint
ed, arc noT ready and hundreds more
going up Tor the workmen who srs to
man these Immense steel plants-one
OF which is TO be the largest In the
United States, and | WAS told that by
the 1st OF April these plants at Ensley
VIII require 5000 meu, and thew with
their families would make up a popula
tion OF 100000 people. There are a clu..
ter OF five furnaces there now that turn
out 100 tons OF pig iron every day, and
these are not the half of them-and the
great steel plant is to make G,OOO tons
OF steel every day. Mirabile dictu ~
Have | got these figures down right. /
made some notes on tho back OF an en-.
vclope and that's the way they read
know that the 26,000 operatives is
right, though another man said 10000
Not long ago / rctold story that q
frtenc told me about his bunting ey-
pedltions in the Pan Handle region inst
after the civil war, and how he ana his
companions camped imam Old cabin Que
night and the wolves came down from
tho mountains and besieged them, aud
how they shot at them all night through Ii
tue cracks between the logs and killed |
bundreds OF them, and Us fast as thev
Killed them tho pack o. hungry var.
mints would jump on the dead ones and |
eat them all up-all except the hair |
and bOnes-and how the wolves left al |
day break, and after they were all gone |