The age-herald., 1900-10-02
SKETCHES FROM
 EVERYDAY LIFE

People have had some excuse the last week or two for talking about the weather. We have had weather to burn; if anybody in Birmingham had been thoughtless enough to strike a match in the last two weeks there would have been an explo- sion. Birmingham people live in the midst of fiery furnaces; there are furnaces to the right, furnaces to the left, furnaces before them and furnaces behind them, and in the midst of these jaws of death live the 4OO
 When in addition to these fiery furnaces. the heat from which would singe Shad- rach, Meshsck and Abednigo, the sun smiles little more warmly than usual, truly the heat is something to talk about, If you are not too exhausted by it to talk at all
 And then a very versatile conversational ist, after exhausting his listener and the subject of the heat. can find much to say (though it would not do to print it) about the dust. This has been SD thick recently that people are asking each other if this muriSy atmosphere is not just like dear old 'Lunnon,'' and some of the chappies, on account of 1t, are cultivating an English
 
 by the dust are the throat specialists, who have long vista of sore throats infamed by dust staring at them every day. At a dollar spray every specialist should be getting rich. There is new throat spray CT, however, that is more palatabie than carbolic acid, glycerine and menthol It is sold over the counters and contains lime juice, little sugar and gin and one or two n Inc ,gfz lr.,a
 who sells it. It does not cost dollar a spray, but the moderate sum of 15 cents
 How long, how long, will Birmingham people breathe dust instead of fresh air? We have nobody to blame for the dust but ourselves. There is no use to damn the weather. complain of the weather bureau or pray for rain. If wishes were horses, every beggar would ride. You can't wish a rain You can pray for it, but, as a preacher once said when requested to do so, that he was willing to be obliging, but 'twarnt no use as long as the wind was in the west"
 One thing, however, is fatal to these iit- tie grains of sand, and that is little drops of water. There is the ancient story of the man who advertised that for 10 cents he would send a certain remedy for killing feas. A confiding soul who sent the money was told to place flea on one brick. hold il there with one hand and strike it with another brick and the flea would trouble him no more. A similar recipe would ap- ply to getting rid of the dust. Put a speclx of dust on a pane of glass, hold it so that the wind will not blow it off and put a drop of water on it, and the dust will be rendered harmltss
 City people live for years and years breathing dust just as if there was no way of getting rid of it. Then some enterprise ing spirit makes kick" and calls for watering carts. If these are furnished, the dust is laid, and as they say in the novels. they live happily ever afterwards. For q period of time variously estimated from 5000 to 14,0O0 years people have ridden in vehicles without rubber tires, joltins their spinal columns and churning their brains, until in the year 1900, A. D., some one in- terested in the rubber trust thought of putting rubber on wheels, and the world has ceased jogging along in the bad old way, and now rolls smoothly on rubber tires and ball bearings just as they always should have done.
 Now the time will surely come in Bir- mingham when some man will be amazed at the size of his throat doctors bill and will angrily join in with the enterprising spirit and demand watering carts. If he gets mad enough they will give them to him, and the specks of dust twill fold their tents like the Arabs and as silently steal away
 As it is now, the dust germs are given no rest. Some after the business of the day, such as getting in eyes, threats and ears, Is over, sink slowly to the ground and nestle like some timid flower in the rifts between the paving stones. Here if they were let alone they would remain. but black fiend comes along at 1 o'clock at night with monstrous machine, hauled by two helpless horses and routs out these dust germs from their dreams and sends them flying in vast clouds over the city to seek other pastures and find new victims, while the black iend murmurs of the dust:
 Sweet and low, sweet and low
 Wind O the Western sea
 Blow, blow, breath and blow
 Blow them again to me,
 While my little one,
 While my pretty one.
 Sleeps.
 New York is suffering from an epidemic of suicides. The weather is so hot that many people are trying to shuffle off their mortal coils. This is a mistake, the coil should be the last thing to take off. The astonishing thing about the habit of suicid- ing Is the number of people who fail. Some
 tati ohoxu that 9S per cent of people fail in business. The percentage of suicidal failures is not so large. People fail oftenest to suicide when they suicide on account of failure Nations go to war about little trifies and people go to death for just as trivial req sons. This fact Is we'll known, but it Is always interesting to know what each ones reason is George Burch killed himself be-
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