davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
EMPTY HOUSES IN LONDON.
Fifty Thousand of Them at Presen,
 Said to Re Lacking Tenants.

| Fifty Thousand of Them at Present Said to Re Lacking Tenants. Fifty thousand empty houses in Lon. don. John Burns made thls startling announcement In the house of commons recently, says Tit-Bits. Large as this number is there are those who believe It Is under rather than over the mark. A remarkable change has taken place during the past five or six years | Whereas, formerly landlords were mas. l terS of the situation, tenants have now the whip hand In nearly every district and are offered all manner of induce ments to take houses.
 It Is not long since that premium | or, what amounts to the same thing key money'-was demanded by prop, erty owners in some parts of London. Today numbers of such men will act ually allow tenants a discount, which consists in the case of small property of the expenses of removal up to Il, or else of so many weeks occupation free. Usually no rent is required for the first fortnight, but in certain To- calities the competition between prop erty owners is so keen that the period in some cases is one month making the discounts about f2 2s or f2 5s.
 A more curious bait is free insur- ance. One company gratuitously in- sures each of its tenants against fire /; while another, besides safeguarding the householder against this conting- ency, relieve him of apprehension re- specting any damage to his furniture by lightning or flood.
 Certain separate charges have also been swept away, particularly in the case of flats, which, 1t Is said, are now drug in the market. Some landlords, for instance, made one for the clean ing of the common staircase, this, with the "extra" for gas, amounting to about Is Cd per week. The IS pence was really rent, and the reason 1t was not called such was partly to evade payment of rates. When-this Is an actual case-a man owned about fifty flats and returned their rent as b pence per week each less than It really was, his assessment was considerably lower than 1t ought to have been, and consequently he did not pay his due proportion of rates. But, of late "ex- tras" have frequently been cut to the amount formerly set down as rent"
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
..The Greatest widower.

This is said to be the title of genu- inc essay evolved some years ago by a boy in a Welsh board school:
 King Henry VIII. was the greatest widower that ever lived. He was born at Anno Domini in the year 1066. He had 510 wives besides children. The first was beheaded and executed. The second was revoked. She never smiled again. But she said the word Calais would be found on her heart after her death. The greatest man in this reign was Lord Sir Garret Wolsey. He was sir named the Boy Bachelor. He was born at the age of 15, unmarried. Henry VIII. was succeeded on the throne by his great-grandmother the beautiful and accomplished Mary, queen of Scots, sometimes known as the Lady of the Lake"
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Church That Is Battling for Progress

In the early part of the winter we decided that In order to get acquainted with the newcomers we must have good social aftermeetIng In the chapel adjoining the church. This meeting was at first of the most informal char acter The ladies served coffee and cake and there was real mixture of the classes.
 One night whenwe had had number of these social aftermeetings a working man was asked to give us a fiyeminute talk. He did so, and before we were prepared for it We were confronted with new phase-a new necessity. After that it seemed quite natural to ask any one of prominence who hap pened to be present to speak. Later We asked for questions from those who would not, or could not, make a speech. We then found It necessary to have prepared program and a chairman. The church services had n gradual in- crease in attendance, and the after.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
CURIOUS HOTEL CUSTOMS.
Where Every Cuss Word Costs a
 Penny.

A curious custom prevails at an Edin- burgh hotel. says Tit-Bits. Whenever a customer Is heard to swear he Is re quired to place penny in box on the bar counter. It Is not a matter for surprise that the landlord hears much less bad language than some of his fel- low publicans in the capital of Scot land.
 The following is quaint idea for providing funds for picnics and social evenings. It Is carried on with much success at an Ashton-on- Mersey inn A "knocking club Is connected with the inn, and when customer calls for refreshments he is expected to knock on the table or counter before drinking. If he fails to do this he Is fined one penny. Any one who wrongfully accuses anoth- CT of breaking this unique rule Is also fined. The money thus obtained pro- vides funds for many enjoyable outings and pleasant evenings during the course of the year.
 At another hotel, known as the Old Hundred, customers are allowed only one drink. If one Is not sufficient to quench their thirst they are obliged to go out of the hotel and take a walk be- fore they are allowed to have another.
 Till recently the proprietor of an old time hotel In Warwickshire used to in- vite all his customers to accompany him and his wife to the service at the parish church on Sunday mornings, which was situated on the opposite side of the road, the house being closed while they were away On returning each custom CT was invited to partake of refresh ments offered by the hospitable landlord free of charge.
 Visitors to a certain hotel in Aber- deenshire who wear brown boots must remember to keep them in their room over night. Otherwise the boots will be blacked, regardless of the original color of the same In one of the rooms of a Dumfries public house is an old arm chair which is said to have been ire quently used by the poet Burns.
 A small hotel in Wales until quite re- gently was used by the Catholics as a place of worship on Sundays, and po- lice court proceedings were held on the premises during the week.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Girl, that Throw Stones.

It Is hardly worth while to tell you that a girl cannot throw stone like a boy; you have all seen them try 1t and perhaps have laughed at their efforts, which was wrong, of course, but nat ural, for it really Is a funny sight. But 1t is likely that you did not attribute their failure to the right cause. You thought, perhaps-that is, you boys thought-that 1t was merely a girls awkward attempt to initiate boy but in that you were wrong, for 1t Is a physical impossibility for a girl to throw with the free movement of the arm that boy has, because her collar bone is larger than boys, and Is set lower. This comes from physician in a girls college, who has made care ful study of the matter, impelled there to, 1t may be, by the importantly of the girls, who were ambitious to equal or excel the boys In this physical ac- complishment, as they have done in
 many others. In any sport where this
 free use of the arm and shoulder is not required a girl may excel, but she may
 as well give up all hope of ever throw ing stones the same way as boys do. In spite of all this, we find girl now
 and then who can throw almost as far.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Reluctant English Courtesy.

That gifted publicity man, A. Toxin Worm, made the preposterous claim in London last winter that he would see to 1t that there was no "booing" of the actors at the opening performance by E. H. Sothern. This popular Eng fish diversion consists of believing through the hands and no first night" is supposed to be complete without yo- cal Interruptions.
 On the night of MT. Sothern's first performance some forty-fve evil-look- ing men, bearing blackjacks in their sleeves were distributed throughout the gallery and pit. There was no in- terruption from the audience that night, but only the occasional dull thud of blackjacks upon knuckles. Every hand that was raised as preliminary to the "booing' process received a quick blow. Mir. Worm says that he never saw so many limp hands and so many bewildered faces assembled in any one place as he saw that first night among the crowd that left the theater.
 At the close of the week that dig nifed journal, the Times, commented gravely upon the growing courtesy of English audiences toward American actors, and witnessed the case of six productions by Mir. Sothern without a single ''boo."-Success Magazine.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

meetings grew in the same proportion. It was strange sight to see hundreds of people emerge from the pews, get into file-four to six deep-and slowly squeeze through the chancel doors Into the chapel. This was a slow process. but it gave us chance to shake hands with the people as they went through.
 In the conference we discussed child labor, model tenements, the unem- ployed, the bread line,' individualism. socialism, and kindred topics. The leading speakers were given half an hour and speakers on the floor three minutes. The very sound of the word socialism made some of our people nerv- ous and uneasy. Some heard 1t one night and returned not again; others heard 1t and fought 1t violently still others grew to like it.-Success Mag. 0Zlnp
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
The Kings Cock Grower,

In the good old time there was a. :. English court official known as the kings cock crower. It seems strange office. Why did the king require cock crower, and why could not the common barn door variety serve his majesty's purpose? The reason, as you shall see, was that the barn door variety cannot be depended upon for times and hours, and he has never been persuaded to ob- serve Lent. Now, this was pious GUS tom and a religious duty. All through Lent the kings cock crower crowed instead of calling the hours of the night in the palace. He began on Ash Wednesday, when he entered the hal
 in which the kings supper was served, and then crowed the hour in the pres ence of the royal party. The meaning
 the custom is obvious. It was only me of the many ways In which the history of the Christian religion was brought home to the minds of people before the reading of the gospel in the vernacular. The office was continued down to the year 1s22.-London Queen.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

one room of cold storage warehouse to all the other rooms in it, we should, theoretically, be able to distribute It from a central point of houses, office buildings, theaters and the like, at a distance, as is done with gas and steam. But the size and the cost of the plant required, the imposslbility of de veloping a degree of cold which will not be disslpated In transit unless pipes of prohibtive size are employed, has placed the idea in the category of laboratory dreams. Even the use of liquid air or liquid hydrogen would not obviate this last objection. The cost of the production and the dlstribu- ton would outweigh the benefits.
 Science does not recognize the i'm. possible, however, and If Prof. Cnnes has produced liquid which, forced to iistant points through pipes small enough to be strung like telephone wires. Is so cold that such distribution ,annot materially Impair Its effective ness-and this seems to be the case science has achieved a most revolu- tionary triumph"
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
During the current fiscal year, whI

During the current fiscal year, which began with July, the Department of Agriculture will expend fifteen million dollars When one compares this sum with four million dollars which was spent in 1902, one gets an Idea of the rate at which this department Is grow ing. With the possible exception of the Postoffice Department, no other de- partment comes so near to the people. and none touches the ordinary citizen on so many sides. The forestry serv- ice, the bureau of animal industry, the testing of foods, the study and predic- tion of the weather, the development of new plants, the building of roads, the crop reports-these are only a few of the many ways in which this depart ment Is helping the people of the whole country. One item of ten thousand d.l- lars to be spent this year may result in the saving of millions. It will be used for testing plants believed to be suit able for paper-making.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
And since he weighs but fifty pounds By simple processes I've found
A Transformation.

She used to chew gum at school, ana at play, and at church, and most all of the time. She took her gum to the table with her and stuck 1t on the un- der side of her plate, under there where it says Ironstone China. Sometimes when she passed her plate for more mashed potatoes and gravy, if you please, her papa would take hold or the chewing gum that was stuck under heath. And would he then be vexed! Oh, very, And when she went to bed she stuck her gum on the bedpost so that she could find 1t In the night, and many a whole night long her jaw wag- gled in her sleep.
 Well, she grew up to be big girl, just as you will grow up; and about the time she started to High School strange thing happened. The jaw muscles on the sides of her face, here and here, began to swell up Pretty soon she looked as if she had two base balls in her mouth, one on each side. The more she chewed her gum the big ger these DdseDdlis Sol, anu oA0 i'0ANN so funny that people simply could not love her, no matter how hard they tried. So she went away and joined dime museum, and the muscles of her jaw are so strong that she bites silver dollars in two for any one who will advance the coin, and she uses lead pipe instead of gum, because 1t doesn't wear out so fast.
 Do you still want the chewing-gum? Yes? And you don't care If you grow up with a chewing-gum face: Not a bit? Well, well. Take the stuff, my willful child, but when you get through with it, don't you leave 1t where your father will step in it.-Newark Even- ing News.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

the second hand man will have nothing but whole papers, and they must be clean, at that" This little monologue may be heard most anywhere. The con ditions are about the same in any city of large or medium size. There Is a great deal of accumulated material around house which Is quite difficult to dispose of. It might be burned, but an effort to dispose of the mass In an ordinary stove would more than likely lead to disaster, even if the stove Is of suitable proportions to accommodate the collection. Most of them are not
 The housekeeper's quandary has led to the invention of a model device to be added to the equipment of the house hold. It Is a refuse destructor, in which the accumulatIons of the house hold are to be disposed of by burning in the back yard without danger. The destructor Is a basket of wire built on an iron frame, supporting 1t several inches above the ground. Into this the household accumulations are dumped, AS well as the sweepings. A match ap- piled soon reduces the big pile to a handful of dust. Such a device solves completely the problem of the disposal of a great deal of material.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

Bishop Frank NJ. Bristol declared in Chicago that the superannuates fund Is the easiest one to get money for. Undoubtedly this is true, at a gathering of preachers. It is to be hoped that Bishop Bristol's assertion is becoming generally true of the Meth
 odist laity. There are signs that il is. There are reasons for the indiffer
 ence toward the claims of the worn out preachers which has been largely complained of, and for the awakening from that indifference which is now becoming manifest. Many laymen have not realized that, while there are in this country as wide opportunities as there ever were for young men, and wider, there is not the chance there once was for men past middle life to attain ma terial success in new calling. This change comes inevitably when the wild erness is conquered and the land really populated. Then, again, many laymen have had their interest, not in religion, but in the church and its condition, cooled by the attitude of some conspic- uous preachers, and their numerous imitators, toward themselves and their business. When the preacher becomes a lecturer, apparently striving to preach everything but the gospel, deny ing the authority of his office, and ask ing to be taken simply as man in his profession, others cannot be blamed for judging him on his individual merits, just as they do men in other profes- sions, and losing respect for the divine calling which the preacher has virtual ly repudiated. There is an increasing public consciousness of the change in material conditions which makes it al- most impossible for man past middle life who has not achieved reasonable success in his calling to change it for new one. And there Is a growing public awakening to the truth that the Christian ministry, to be worth while, must be not merely profession chosen like the lawyers or the engineers, but a response to a divine call to deliver a message which its bearer cannot know and be silent about. With the purging of the ministry that is slowly but surely going on-with its increas- ing restriction to men who know they have the message, as evidenced by that very decline of candidates for 1t so much lamented-there should come a new birth of respect for the real preacher of the gospel-for the man who must and does preach the gospel because he cannot be silent without feeling himself a traitor to himself and to God. And so the claims of the worn-out preacher, whose devotion to his mission and his message has led him to live for his faith, and that alone, through all the years until old age comes and he can do no more, are pressing home to the hearts and souls of men as they never did before.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Kitchen Miracles.

In Aunt Amelia's kitchen there are many
 wonders done, Such miracles are wrought as never seen
 beneath the sun: A pumpkin from the garden-just yell
 low sphere that lies Beneath her skillful handling ripens
 quickly into pies; The corn grows into fritters, you must
 marvel at the change; The apples change to dumplings in the
 glowing kitchen range; She waves her hands above it, and the
 milk is cottage cheese. You merely watch her, and you see such
 miracles as these. She finds it easy, quite, to make blue
 berries into rolls: And eggs are changed to omelets above
 the glowing coals; And sometimes when she's fixing the ma
 terials for pies She turns cider into mince- meat right be-
 fore your very eyes. Sometimes she makes a currant roll-you
 would not think she could Or makes a peach turn over, or does some
 thing just as good; But she says quite the hardest task that
 ever she has found Is, when she has her boys at tea, to make
 these things go round Youths Companion.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
The University Stylist.

This editorial from the weekly paper of Missouri University shows what higher education does for lucid writ. CTS: Sometimes during the year there arise certain occasions whose circupl- stances are peculiar in that all of them force the onlooker to the same conclu- sion. That is, person Is not enabled to consider the various phases of suQh questions, and then announce 1t as his belief that the matter has two sides, and that as such is the case he Intends keeping the affair off his mind as much as possible. On the contrary, this type of situation can allow of but one opin- ion, for the reason that every motive exists for adopting one course as right, and decrylng the other as wrong."
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

time custom of cutting out sailors trousers on shipboard. when the cutter would simply run the shears straight down the cloth, without making any at tempt to give the leg shape. This was due partly to haste, partly to indlffer- ence to style. Another plausible expla- nation Is the following: Sailors ire quently have to row ashore and bare footed step into the water and pull their boat up on the beach. The width Of their trousers at the bottom allows them to roll their trousers high to keep them dry.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

affected. But what the stock exchange does is to gamble with the capital and resources of the United States, to fix. as at present, rates of interest artiti' cially low In order to boom stock prices and at other times to bid interest rates to absurd heights, to the Injury oi commerce and industry. Its demoral izing effects come from the fluid capita. of the United States being used fol gambling purposes and taken from legitimate industry. The morals of Wall street, whether by day or night are matters of little more public in. terest than the personal habits of book makers.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

German interests in Argentina and Brazil are so great that German cap italists have decided 1t Is worth while investing six and half million dollars in new telegraph cable connecting the fatherland with South America. The imperial government will protect the investors from loss. This is one of the ways by which the ties between the Germans abroad and those at home are preserved, as well as one of the meth ods adopted for fostering the expansion of German commerce.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Self-Evident,

Once when Chauncey Olcott was in Ireland he visited the wishing well at Killarney with two plain, elderly spins ters. Beside the well sat an old Irish woman, who looked up into MT. Ol- cott's handsome face and asked:
 "Phat are you wishing for?"
 "What do you think I wish forT' he good naturedly inquired.
 "Och, thin, for beautiful young swateheart, of course," she said.
 He pointed to the two spinsters, who stood at little distance, and said:
 Don't you see that have two with meT
 "Ah, thin it's the grace O God you're wishin' for" replied the sympa. thetic old woman.-New York Times
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
A Much-Discussed Question.

Why are the trousers that sailors wear so wide at the bottom? The question has been asked over and over again, and, strange as it may seem, no one not a sailor knows exactly how to answer 1t. The editor is unable to give the origin of the fashion authori- tatively, but he heard a man who is pretty well informed in questions of that kind say 1t grew out of the old
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

It was from New York that Horace Greeley advised the young man to "Go Vest" The advice now comes from three thousand miles farther eastward, and is addressed by Israel Zangwill to an audience of Jews In London. He told his fellow religionlsts the other day that they ought to migrate to the Western States of America, where there is room for them.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
The Chewing-Gum Face.

My dear child, before I give you the chewing gum will ask your attention for a few moments to little story
 Once upon a time there was a little girl just like you, and she liked chew ing-gum so well that she would nave gone without dinner to get some of it.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
True, Too True!

After all," said the optimist, "oul neighbors turn out to be better than some of us seem to think them to be-"
 Perhaps" replied the pessimist, but none of them will ever turn out to be as good as most of us seem to think they ought to be.'-Philadelphia Press.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

lection of papers, scraps and paste board boxes, the roundup of the regular weekly cleaning. TT h e ashman declines to take anything but ashes, the rubbish
 man picks out only such as he can find use for, and
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24
Second HeN

Young Isaacs-Fadder, ees marriage a failure?
 The Elder Isaacs-vell, my boy, eef you marry a real, real. rich girl, mar riage ees almost as good as a failure Success Magazine.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

Asthma and society" drove an old man West to begin life over again among strangers Of course asthma sometimes demands heroic treatment, but he could have escaped from society by merely disposing of his automobile.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

It is said that there Is enough coal in Alaska to put off the fuel famine from the exhaustion of coal which had been predicted at the end of the pres ent century. This news will be great relief to present coal consumers who have been alarmed over what they had to expect In about ninety years.
Alaska sentinel., 1908-12-24

That's a wise doctor who says that it's the comfortable old shoes, not the tight, new ones, which hurt women's feet He ought to do a rushing busi- nesa