davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

That may account for the paternalistic care with which he regarded the locomo- lives he had to restore to good condi- tion. Year after year he plodded along The silver came into his hair and his once erect form began to bend under the weight of his years. His tasks were made lighter without his knowledge Younger men relieved him of all heavy work and he was left to do practically what he pleased. He was a privileged character.
 If old man Palmer had as much theo- retical knowledge of mechanics as he has practical he might have become a great inventor. He liked to tinker with the things that bothered the men about the shop, and there are dozens of devices in use there now that he rigged up to simplify the work. Some of them are quite ingenious, but none of them is of enough importance to warrant special mo- tice. There was time when he thought he had unusual ability in this line and possibly he had some ambitious dreams That was long ago, however, and when the wonderful lathes and the multitudes of other machines that came to the shop disclosed their marvels to him he did not have much opinion of his own ideas What he saw before him was so far be- yond anything he could conceive in that field that he smiled at his own presump- tfon.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

ones rising and falling on a board rest ing on the edge of a sharp stone making seesaw.
 One of the games played is like our Button. button, who has the button?" The boys stand in row with the hands folded andt he one who is it goes along and rubs his two hands holding the pebble over each pair of folded hands, endeavoring to drop the pebble into one without being caught. It is then necessary to guess who has the pebble. We play the same game with the button.
 Another game is known as the ''tied monkey" In this the boy who is "it'' catches hold with one hand of rope which is fastened to a peg in the ground while the others beat him with handker chiefs or ropes in which knots are tied. If he can catch one of them without letting go his hold on the rope the boy caught takes his place.
 Worth More Than Girls
 I observe that the boys here usually play by themselves They rather look down upon their sisters, and the ordinary family considers the girl of but little account. When girl Is born no fuss is made. but when a boy comes the friends of the family run through >the streets crying out: Good tidings! Good tid- ings!' The father prepares a feast and all of the friends of the family give pres ents of money for the benefit of the boy. Immediately after the child is born it is rubbed over with salt It is then wrapped in waddling cloths so tight that 1t cannot move and kept in that state for about week It is then un- fastened. washed with fresh oil, salted and bound up again. This wrapping, oil- ing, salting and rewrapping goes on for about forty days, when a child is ready to wear the ordinary clothes of babyhood. This usually consists of one garment. and in the summer If the child be poor that is omitted, although naked baby may wear skull cap. The ordinary garment is a shirt which reaches to the knees, and as the children grow older they may Have jacket over the shirt.
 One of the important ceremonies Is nam- ing the boy. In this the name of the father Is always added. In olden times if the son of James was named John, his name would be John, son of James, but now the words ''son of are omitted and he is known as John James.
 Pretty Little Naxarenes
 I am surprised nt the beauty of the Nazarene girls, and especially of the little ones. They have rosy cheeks and bright eyes and are quite as good looking as our American babies. They dress in bright colors some having rows of coins on their headdresses and rings on their fingers
 see many little girls at the fountain of Mary, each carrying jar in which to bring water home. This Is the work of almost every woman in Syria. The little ones are taught by beginning with a tiny jar which they steady on the head with the hands. As they grow older they use larger jars, until at last they are able to walk through the streets carrying four or five gallons of water on the head with out touching the jar. Thfs work gives
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

had been working for years on the great problem, and how he now was satisfied he had made decided progress toward solving it. He wanted the president to take 1t up and install 1t in all the loco- motives on the great system. He showed all the tabulations he had made. and ex- plained how. much of saving in coal it meant per locomotive.
 The president had heard so much at various times of coal economizers that he was mildly skeptical. but he did not say so or let the old man know it. He asked to see the patent papers. and was sur prised when Palmer told him he had not patented his device.
 Tt belongs to the company" said the old man. You patent it. worked 1t out on the company's time and I got paid for the time I put in on 1t. And I never could have done anything with 1t If I hadn't the chance to try 1t out on our engines"
 The president said some pleasant things to the old man, and after telling him he would make proper trials of the econo- mixer, dismissed him.
 Within two weeks the president had a report regarding the economizer. The trials on which the report was based were made. far away from the division on which old man Palmer had worked so many years. When the president studied tue HE BureS III Iles report Ho ioohou troubled. They showed that everything old man Palmer had claimed for the economizer was correct
 Some months later there was meeting of the directors of the Deep River Coal combination. The chairman reported a most satisfactory years business. and had a most hopeful view of the coming year. 'I feared at one time," he said. 'I would have to make a rather bad report for the coming year. I had reason to fear the contract with our largest custo- mer would be reduced.'
 Do you mean the K, T. & NIT" in- quired one of the directors. "Yes," replied the chairman "I heard a rather peculiar story about
 the K, T. & N.," the director went on.
 'I heard an old man who had been with
 the company long time was discharged because he made lot of talk about tho president. Said he invented coal econo-
 mixer and turned the patent over to the
 president, and then the president report I ed the thing was no good. Of course. the old fellow Is crazy"
 Probably he is," remarked the chair man in a doubting tone.
 Docs that same percentage go to the president of the K, T. & N. for the com- ing year?" asked the talkative director. The chairman hesitated few seconds before replying. Then he said slowly: Tt does not go, because it has gone already.
 If had not been able to make the ad- vance in a time of need--you know our friend sometimes gets embarrassed-I think our prospect for the coming year would not be so fiattering.'
 Copyright, 1911, by Richard Spi1lane.)
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15
old man Palmer every locomotive on the division was a child-a child

Tl old man Palmer every locomotive
 on the division was child-a child
 \ to be watched over cared for, doc tored in illness. petted for good behavior and occasionally punished for bad con- duct. Every one of the huge machines had to him its own particular character istics, It's own peculiar personality. It did not matter if dozen were of the same
 ne, built in the same works. at the
 afne time every part alike, each and
 very one of them was to him as distlnc- i've and as unlike as members of the human family. He had more patience with machinery than he had with men, and he would ask questions as he pot tered around a locomotive that had been gent to the shops for overhauling much ,~ physician or mother would with a child that had suffered some hurt.
 ouldnt stand 1t any longer, ehI' he ", uiu ay. Just had to come back to the old man, didpt you? And what's the matter now?' Strained yourself a bit, didn't you? I don't wonder. Shame the way they treated you. And who had you this time? Jim Reilly? Ugh! not fit to be a wiper"
 Indt was the ll1Illt III Cout6HlptuOuS eA- pression with old man Palmer. He ap- piled 1t to many engineers, for he felt to- ward most of the tribe sense of per- sonal wrong They were unkind or negectful or lacking in essential knowl- edge of machinery. If they knew their business and were more considerate loco- motives would not suffer so much.
 Somehow old man Palmer could not be made to believe that locomotives did not suffer. There was no sweeter harmony in the world to him than the rhythmic tones that came from the locomotive in full play of its glorious power. Occasionally when he went over the road and sat in the cab with the engineer he would close his eyes and sit in rapture. Not sound would he utter or a move would he make for five or ten minutes at a time. No titan opera troupe could touch tho notes that came to him from the vibrant, pull sing monster with which his soul was attuned and whose every mood he seemed t. know.
 But if 1t was joy to him to hear the rhythmic tones, discord brought frowns. It hurt to hear any creak in the great ma chine. To his highly trained ear every. discordant sound told its own story of loose valve here, bolt that needed tight ening there or weak rod somewhere else. Then he would fret and worry until he could get everything right again. He was great believer in rest for a locomo- tive. He thought 1t was as necessary for them as 1t is for humans. Sometimes when the flood of traffic would bring ev- cry locomotive into use and when some of them would be kept in almost contin-
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

stoop shoulders nor curved spines among them.
 When girl reaches ten or eleven years of age she begins to think of marriage. and 1t Is not an uncommon thing for her to be a mother at thirteen or fourteen. After marriage the wife becomes mem Der of her husbands family, and for a time at least, she lives with her mother in-law. For this reason people believe in early marriages, whereby the girl may be trained by her husbands mother into suitable wife when she grows up. Look at the Schools I wonder if the boys of our Savior's time studied as do the Nazarene boys today. Many of them are taught by the sheiks, as half of the town is Mohamme- dan. They sit on the floor and sway back and forth as they scream out the verses and texts they are trying to learn. The teacher is sometimes blind, but he knows the voices so well that one stops he can strike the place where that boy should be sitting with stick to start him again. In our Lords time the scrip trues were probably taught the same way to the Jewish children. The slates used here are largely made of cast-off coal oil cans, the tin being cut into squares and pounded out flat The Arabic characters are painted upon such tins with brushes and india ink.
 The chief study of the Mohammedan boys is the Koran. and of the Jews the Psalms. At harvest time the schools close and the children go out into the fields, gardens and vineyards. They are accustomed to work, and everywhere go I see them herding the sheep. The boys use slings just as David did and they are skillful in sending the stones where they please.
 Like Little Americans
 Some of these Palestine children arc polite and others are the reverse. When the good Arab boy comes into a room full of older people he goes around and kisses the hand of each one and places 1t on his forehead. He can be so sweet you might think him the soul of innocence and pety, but, take him outside and E1 will fight. kick and scratch with h- fellows. great deal of slang is used and in a quarrel the most common ex- pressions are those of cursing your enemy's ancestors. One boy will say to another. Curse your father!'' and the other will reply. And your grandfatherv' And so they will go on to the fourth and fifth generations. cursing the various branches of the others genealogical tree. Here at Nazareth we find the children very polite, but at Nablous they threw stones at me and called me "a Naaarene. a contemptuous term which the Moham- medans of Samaria use for all who aros not of their faith.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

uous service for weeks at a time the old man would discant upon the wickedness of such thing. 1t was not right, 1t was not just, to overwork machine any more than 1t was a man, he would declare and he would not be altogether happy until the rush ended and he had an opportunity to get the ailing among his pets back in the shop.
 Queer man was old Palmer. He had been with the road nearly 50 years when he worked out his invention. The road was not the big trunk line it is today when he first knew it. Instead of it's thou sands of miles of track, its many thou sand cars, It's hundreds of millions of dollars in stocks and bonds and its army of employees, 1t was jerkwater bit of a road less than 75 miles long that wandered over the hills and valleys of Illinois. It's roadbed was joke, its iron rails gro- tesquely light and it's total equipment con- sisted of three locomotives, six squeaky passenger cars and IS freight cars. The locomotives burned wood. Once day a combination freight and passenger train went over the road.
 To the mind of old man Palmer the wonderful locomotives with which the road is equipped today are magnificent, but occasionally, when he talked in the roundhouse or the shop of old times, he would tell some marvellous tales of those woodburners of the early sixties. He had come out of the war in 'ss. wounded. and had taken a job as fireman on the K, T. N. It was five years before he became an engineer and 1t was ten be- fore he was put in the shops. The road had spread, grown and branched, but he had remained on the old main line. There were days of financial tragedy to the road when Wall street wrecker into whose hands 1t had fallen sapped 1t of it's strength. There was long period of bankruptcy when the visit of the paycar was not too regular and there was long period of privation and the most rigid economy when the employees and the patrons of the road had to pay the penalty for the crimes of that Wall street buccaneer. Then gradually prosperity came to the property and with it an amazing outreaching of its tracks and a not less amazing increase in its traffic.
 Through all its transitions Palmer re- mained faithful. Presidents came and presidents went. old interests sold out and new ones came into control, but 1t was all the same to him. He worked away in the shop, his life bounded by the Illinois division and all his energies cen tered on his daily tasks. He knew the soul of the wood burner; he knew the soul of the high wheeled coal burning flyers of light weight that succeeded them, and he knew the soul of the mon sters that are in service today Possibly If he was more selfish and had a keener sense of his own worth he might have attained a good position, but he was con- tent to jog along. His needs were sim pie. His wife had died many years ago and he had no children to look after.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

Copyright, 1910, by Frank G. Carpenter.l
 Nazareth, "HIS is the home of Christ's boyhood
 Here He came as a baby after that
 ! long trip to Egypt where he went to escape the bloodthirsty Herod. and here He spent all but about four years of His life I want to tell you how Maya reth looks in this year of our Lord 1910 The town Is situated high up in the mountains of Gallilee. within 60 miles of Jerusalum as the crow flies and six ty-seven miles from Bethlehem, where Jesus was born. It is within a days ride on horseback of Mount Carmel, where Elijah slew the false prophets and within four hours of Capernaum on the Sea of Gallilee, from where our Savior took His apostles and where he first preached.
 Nazareth lies in a nest in the noun tains. It is in a little ampitheater of hills with a rough and ragged arena. The houses run up the sides of the hills and there Is hardly a level spot in the whole municipality. It is not large town. It has altogether less than 12.0o0 people of whom about half are Mohammedans who look upon Christ as a prophet. The re- mairider Is made up of Greek Catholics, Latir,s and about 200 syrians. of the Prot sestant faith. The town is one of churches and corvents. It has some great ~mon- asteries and hospices where pilgrims are 2 kept over night.
 The residences of the people are rec tangular structures. which look more like great stone boxes than houses. They are Arru nd fvvn windows, and the most of them have flat roofs, which in the summer form the resting and sleeping places at night. Many of tho buildings are in gardens. Some have cactus hedges about them and others are shaded by cyprus trees. There are many olive orchards. and figs grow here as luxur1antly as they did in the time of our Savior.
 Nazareth by Moonlight
 The buildings of Nazareth are ugly but as a whole the city Is beautiful. The sky is so blue. the air is SO clear and all the surroundings are 30 picturesque. shall not soon forget birds-eye view I had of the city last night. The moon was at it's full and its great round sil- yer disk changed the night into day. It's ray mellowed the yellow limestone of which the buildings are made. and trans- formed them to ivory. They softened the glare of the white. rocky roads, and made the mountains and valleys look like those of fairyland. From the top of the hills could see the plain of Esdraelon. which in its fertility vies with tho Nile Valley: and away off at the west lay the mighty Mediterranean. which stretches on for sooo miles to Gibraltar and the Atlantic.
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15

peaceful. At sunset all business stops and within an hour or so afterward every one is in bed. There are few places which are so far from the strife Of the world, and business seems swallowed in the beauties of nature. The scenery is that of old Greece. and the stars shine gloriously out of skies which are per- fectly clear.
 The sunsets are surprisingly beautiful. saw one the other night in which the silvery beams of the sun seemed to form a halo over this the house of our Savior. There were many white clouds in the sky, which changed. first to rose and then became golden, the color growing stronger, until the whole west was one blaze of molten copper and fire.
 Among the Nasarenes
 Coming down into the town after watching one of these sunsets, saw many Nazarene children and stopped to make notes. The little ones gathered around me, and 1t was not hard to imagine similar crowds which played in these streets nineteen hundred years since and of whom the boy Jesus was one. Tho little Nazarenes wore gowns of brown, red or yellow. The most of them were in their bare feet; the boys had caps of red felt, while the girls wore handkerchiefs around their heads. All were running and dancing and laugh ing and playing. Some were beautiful and especially the girls. I remember rosy-cheeked baby which was carried by a roushish bright-eyed maid of eighteen. I admired the baby. and ohucked it under the chin. telling the girl would like to take 1t home with me to America. She promptly said could have it. and thrust 1t out toward me. My face fell and ran.
 In tke Footsteps of Jesus
 There is no doubt but that this is the Nazareth Of Jesus. and that the hills and valleys about here were hollowed by His footsteps. It was here that the Angel Gabriel appeared unto Mary, and told her that she would be the mother of Jesus. and 1t was here that she came with Joseph after the flight Ato Egypt. She waited only until King Herod was dead and then came to Nazareth, the child Jesus still being an infant in arms. It was from Nazareth that Jesus went to the Jordan to be baptized by John, and 1t was here that after He had begun His work our Lord came and preached in the synagogue, whereupon the Nazarenes cried out:
 ''Is not this Joseph's son? And they were filled with wrath, and rose up and thrust Him out of the city and led Him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built that they might cast Him down headlong But He passing through the midst of them went His way"
 was shown the hill to which the Naza- renes led the Savior. intending to cast Him down. It is about mile and half
The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-01-15
The Next Best Thing
From Judge.

From Judge.
 A very small boy who had captured a tadpole proudly carried 1t down to his fathers office. When he opened hls hand to display It, the tadpole was dead.
 Didn't you know that tadpole must have water to liver" asked the father.
 "Yes. father; but I spit on 1t twice oa the way down.
The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1907-1917, 1911-11-30
EDITORIAL NOTES

president Taft is in deep water again.
Instead of staying in Washington, or
Beverly, Mass and attending to his duties as
President, Mr.. Taft lost his Judgment and
made tour of the West and Northwest that
was simply campaign trip-his mission was
political-it was an effort on Mr.. Taft's part
to make his nomination, by the Republicans,
in 1912. certain.
Messrs. LaFollette, Cummins, Bristow and
other Insurgents were beginning to lombard
Mr.. Taft with hot shot-the firing was so
steady that Mr.. Taft grew nervous over the
outlook for 1912-he decided that a trip
through the enemy'y own country was good
political move-carry the fight to the enemy
in the enemy's stronghold his course
in vetoing the tariff bills that would have
given us relief from the Payne-Aldrich
tariff.
While we firmly believed that the vetoing
OF these measures was wrong-that Mr.. Taft
deserved an overwhelming defeat in 1912, for
not making them law, which would have
given the people relief, we did admire Mr..
Taft's courage-the courage to defend his
course in hostile territory.
But we had just begun to admire Mr.. Taft's
courage when he was seized with cold feet,
and chilly feeling up and down the spine
And, 10 and behold, the next thing we knew
the President had cut out discussion Of tariff
measure on his trip and was going to discuss
uniform marriage and divorce laws-he was
The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1907-1917, 1911-11-30

Wny? The people hate the undemocratic,
greedy, and corrupt church.
woodrow Wilson knows perfectly we'll that
the popes relentlessly prosecuted every man
OF liberal Ideas. matter whether priest or
layman Abelard was scholar of advanced
ideas; they manned him and silenced him.
Calico was a man of advanced ideas; they
tortured him, and they gagged him.
Ever on the side of the Kings these despotic
popes have always exerted themselves to crush
any movement of the masses toward secular
education, liberty of speech and popular self
government
1t was the Roman church that was the most
alert, cruel and powerful ally of the Kings in
their reinstatement of the common people.
What shame it is that Woodrow Wilson
should attempt to falsify history! Why does
he seek to delude the unwary? He knows that
the Roman imposture has lost out in Europe,
q0here 1t IS best knOeUn, and that it is redoub-
ling its energies to capture the United States.
why does he help them when he knows that
history will repeat itself, and that our people
will suffer from this abominable Roman HER
erchy what Europe has suffered?
Woodrow Wilson alleges that the Roman
church was the only Christian church during
the Middle Ages It tried to be, admit. It
6IlCO W OUllU0IaU0 all OCnoT CnI1SUlan SoCJS-
tried with fire and sword, with rack and
wheel and burning stakes. But it couldn't
quite succeed.
The Waldenses and other groups kept the
sacred lights OF true Christianity ablaze, and
the pagans of Rome could never wholly ex-
tinguish it,
It is burning shame that Woodrow Wilson,
candidate for President, should forget that
this country settled by fugitives from the
helllsh prosecutions and undemocratic tyran-
MES of the Roman church which he now says
has always been such great, pure, benefcent
democracy