POLITICAL.

OUR Record is closed on the import of ce avere

Numerous of minor

passed by the two Houses of Congress. In the Senate, on the 25th of April, the House bill for the absolute exclusion of the Chinese was rejected, and another was substituted providing for the extension of the present laws for ten years. This substitute, slightly amended, was agreed to and passed by the House, and practically prohibits the importation or immigration of Chinese into this country until June, 1902. Among other bills passed were the River and Harbor Bill, by the House, May 9th, and a bill for enlarging the Yellowstone National Park, by the Senate, May 11th.

A bill was also passed by both Houses authoriz ing the Secretary of the Treasury, under certain conditions, to register as United States vessels highclass steamships built in foreign ship-yards, but controlled by American owners. The immediate effect of this bill was to confer an American registry upon the two largest steamships in the world, the City of New York and the City of Paris.

The difficulty between the Italian government and the United States caused by the lynching of Italian subjects at New Orleans in March, 1891, having been satisfactorily adjusted, diplomatic relations between the two countries were resumed on the 14th of April. The sum of $25,000 was voluntarily given by the United States government for distribution among the families of the victims.

An agreement was entered into, April 20th, between the United States and Great Britain, extending the Bering Sea modus vivendi till October 31, 1893, after which it may be terminated by either power upon giving two months' notice.

On the 28th of April the President nominated Thomas Jefferson Coolidge to be Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States to France in place of Whitelaw Reid, resigned.

On the 15th of April the reservation of the Sisseton Indians in South Dakota, embracing about 1,000,000 acres, was thrown open to settlement; and on the 19th the Cheyenne and Arapahoe reservations in

Oklahoma, 4,000,000 acres, were also opened.

The report of the Chief of the Bureau of Statistics showed that the exports of the United States for the twelve months ending March 31st amounted to $1,006,284,506, being an increase of $134,276,220 over the preceding twelve months. The value of imports for the same period was $837,0 8,585, being an increase of $1,398,221. The total increase in the foreign commerce of the United States during the year was $135,674,441.

Murphy J. Foster, anti-lottery Democrat, was elect ed Governor of Louisiana April 18th.

The following nominations for Governor were made: In Indiana, April 19th, by the Democrats, Claude Matthews; in Illinois, April 28th, by the Democrats, John P. Atgeld; in Missouri, April 28th, by the Republicans, William Warner; in Tennessee, May 4th, by the Republicans, George W. Winstead. The corner-stone of the monument to General U. S. Grant at Riverside Park, New York city, was laid with appropriate ceremonies on the 27th of April, President Harrison officiating.

The official enumeration completed in New York in April showed the population of that State to be 6,510,162.

Near Buffalo, in the State of Wyoming, serious

body ties were threatened between an organized

of cowboys settlers and

men occupying the lands in the vicinity. Several acts of violence, accompanied by bloodshed, occurred, and on the 13th of April, by request of the Governor of the State, three troops of United States cavalry were ordered to the scene of the disturbance. The leading violators of law and order having been placed under arrest, quiet was restored.

Severe shocks of earthquake occurred in California on the 19th, 20th, and 21st of April, destroying a number of buildings and injuring several persons. Political matters in Brazil seemed to be assuming a more hopeful aspect. On the 13th of April the state of siege in Rio Janeiro, which had been proclaimed on the 2d, was raised. A number of naval and military officers who had taken part in a great public manifestation in favor of ex-President Fonseca had been placed under arrest. Troops and war ships had been despatched to Matto-Grosso for the purpose of suppressing a movement for independence which had been inaugurated in that state.

In France, Belgium, and Spain the anarchists continued to give trouble. Explosions of dynamite, caused by these conspirators, occurred in Paris, Liege, Valencia, Cadiz, and several other cities, doing considerable damage and causing much alarm. Numerous arrests were made, and Ravachol and Simon, the leaders of the movement in Paris, were tried and sentenced to penal servitude for life.

A conspiracy against the Bulgarian government was discovered on the 24th of April, and fifteen persons alleged to be among its leaders were arrested.

The Italian cabinet resigned on the 6th of May. In Dahomey a war between the natives and the French colonists was in progress, and despatches received on the 21st of April reported that the former had captured the town of Porto Nuovo. DISASTERS.

Six thousand houses were destroyed, and more than April 12th.—A great fire occurred at Tokio, Japan. fifty lives were lost.-Destructive floods prevailed in northern Mississippi, damaging property to the amount of more than $1,000,000, and causing the death of at least one hundred persons.

April 20th.-A sloop belonging to the Messageries Fluviales foundered in the river Claire in Anam, and thirty soldiers were drowned.

May 10th.-An explosion occurred in the coal mines at Roslyn, Washington, killing thirty-four miners.

May 11th.-Near Brody, in Austrian Galicia, sixty persons were drowned by the capsizing of a raft.

OBITUARY.

April 11th.-At Waterford, New York, Hon. John K. Porter, ex-Judge of the Court of Appeals, aged seventy-three years.

April 16th.-In London, England, Amelia Blandford Edwards, author and Egyptologist, aged sixty

one years.

April 17th.-At Toronto, Canada, the Hon. Alexander Mackenzie, ex-Premier of the Dominion of Canada, aged seventy years.

April 19th.-In New York city, Roswell Smith, publisher, aged sixty-three years.

April 25th.-In Paris, France, William Astor, of New York, aged sixty-two years.

ELIUS and I were friends in our bachelor days. He had been in the army, and I naturally looked up to him. He had an idea that he was an austere man, and was fond of referring to his severity. He used to say, "I always boss the ranch." He had been a brave soldier, and I had no reason to doubt his courage on any point. His was one of those natures whose freshness is preserved by its own quality, and though past middle life, he was a man about town, a toast with every one, and had a reputation for coolness if not for anything more. He used to foster the idea with me that he was impudent to women. I never knew that it rendered him unpopular with them. "They like it, sir," he used to say. "All women are slaves, and need a master."

This was his condition when we went to live in the second floor of Mrs. Trouville's little house. Mrs. Trouville had been a friend

of his in his youth, when she was in good circumstances, before the war. She was now a sorrowful little widow, slim, refined, and delicate, with the remains of her beauty not quite faded, and with a look in her face and a tone in her voice which were pathetic. I believe that Relius went to live there because she was so poor, though the reason he assigned to me for our move was that Patsy, with whom he made the arrangement, satisfied him that the rooms were the best in town, and that we could not do so well anywhere else. Patsy was Mrs. Trouville's maid, and, I believe, her cook also, though of this I was never sure. She was small, thin, elderly, ladylike, of a dark walnut brown, and as near a copy of Mrs. Trouville as she could make herself. She moved with a tread as soft as a black cat's, spoke in a tone as low as a whisper, and wore an old black silk dress of Mrs. Trouville's that had been turned more than once. In fact, she copied Mrs. Trouville as faithfully as she served her.

I observed shortly after we moved in that Patsy treated Relius and me differently. Mrs. Trouville treated us with entire impartiality, being equally kind to both of us, and watchful for our comfort; but Patsy's manner was not the same to us. She brought Relius hot water in the morning, looked after his linen, put his shirt buttons into his dress shirts, and placed pillow-shams on his pillows; whilst I shaved cold when I could not wait for Relius's can, looked after my own shirts, and did without pillow - shams. At table she would say to Relius, "More waffles, Mr. Pelius?" or, "Another cup of coffee, Mr. Relius?" in a tone hardly above a whisper, but full of quiet interest. I mentioned this to Relius, but he scouted the idea, and declared that I was of an envious nature. If there was a difference, he said it was because he treated Patsy with more severity than I did. "You must hold a woman up to her duty, sir," he said. "You must boss the ranch."

This sedulous care extended. Patsy came to exercise a certain supervision over Relius. She saw that he had on his overshoes in snowy weather, or she at least placed them out for him with a constancy which could not be unnoticed. She never said anything; she only looked. Relius became gradually careful how he omitted acting on these un

mistakable suggestions. She took to sitting up for him if she knew he was out, just as she did for Mrs. Trouville. Once or twice, on very inclement evenings, he actually, in view of Patsy's silent presence, gave up the idea of going out. He gradually took to dressing very quickly, and slipping out very quietly, in a way that I could not understand, till once I thought I heard him, in answer to a question from Patsy in the hall, tell her that he was not going out, and afterwards found him dressing. I taxed him with it, but he assured me that I was mistaken, which I was willing to admit. At any rate, he slipped out of the house hurriedly, whilst I went out at my leisure; indeed, more slowly than I wished, because I could not find my pet shirt studs, and had to put up with a broken set. As I passed Patsy on the steps, I told her I wanted her to hunt for the buttons. She made no reply, as usual. We came home together, Relius and I, after a very jolly evening, where Relius had been the life of the party; and he, with his usual considerateness, cautioned me against making any noise, and tripped hastily up the stairs, giving a single glance down over the banisters into the darkness below.

A day or two afterwards he asked me with much concern what in the world I had said to Patsy. I could remember nothing. He said Mrs. Trouville had told him that I had said something to Patsy which had deeply offended her; that Patsy had never before been so spoken to, and that her honesty was above question. I recalled the shirt studs, and said I had never dreamed of accusing her of stealing them, and that I would tell her so. He said no; that he thought he had better settle it, which he would do with Mrs. Trouville, and that anyhow it was just as well to keep her up to her duty. I let him do as he pleased.

A short time after this I came home one night and found Relius dressing for a ball. He was nearly dressed, and was rummaging in a drawer, raking the things angrily backwards and forwards, and using very strong language about "that little fool nigger" who would not let things stay where he put them. Finally he asked me to lend him my stud buttons. I complied, and my generosity moved him to ask me to tell "that fool nigger" after he was gone that he wanted her to find his buttons, and to let them alone thereafter. I promptly refused, and asked him if he was afraid to tell her himself.

'Afraid!" he said, with contempt; he only thought that as Patsy was already down on me, it might be better, if we were going to continue to live there, that she should be kept in a good humor with at least one of us; but as to "afraid," he would show me that he always bossed his ranch. I heard Patsy let him out, but he said nothing about the buttons.

The next morning I was dressing in my room when I heard Relius talking. I looked in at his door. He was curled up under the cover, and his eyes were fast shut. He was

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talking, I supposed, in his sleep. I listened. He was saying: "Patsy, I have unfortunately mislaid my stud buttons. I wish you would hunt for them." The tone was too placid to please him; he began again, on a higher key: Patsy, my shirt studs have got mislaid; I want you to hunt for them." This did not satisfy him either, and he began again, quite sternly: "Patsy, what in the devil have you done with my shirt studs? Get them for me, and hereafter let them alo-"

Just then the door opened, and Patsy entered, silent as a shadow. Relius shut up like a clam. Patsy moved about, opened the windows, lit the fire, and fixed his water. I watched through the crack of the door. Just as she was going out, Relius yawned, stretched, and opened his eyes as if just waking up.

"Oh, Patsy," he said, in the softest and most insinuating of tones, "if you should happen to come across any shirt buttons on the floor today when you are sweeping, will you please put them up on my bureau for me?"

"Yes, sir," said Patsy, as she passed silently

A MODEST CONTRIBUTOR. FOUR or five ladies bustled into Mr. Munn's

private office the other day.

"What can I do for you, ladies ?" he asked, pleasantly.

"Why, Mr. Munn," began one of the visitors, "we are taking up a subscription, and we knew you wouldn't like it if we didn't give you an opportunity to subscribe.”

Mr. Munn bowed graciously, and asked: "And the object? Of course it is a worthy one, or you would not be interested in it.”

"Yes, sir," replied the spokeswoman, we think it a very worthy object. It is to build a home for aged and indigent widows." Excellent! Excellent! I shall take pleasure in making you out a check."

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"Oh, how lovely of you, Mr. Munn!" exclaimed the spokeswoman when she received the bit of paper and read the amount-one thousand dollars. "Oh, we didn't expect to get that much from you! We are ever so much obliged."

"So good of him!” and similar exclamations were heard as the check was passed around for the admiration of the party.

"But, Mr. Munn," said the lady who handled the check last, "you haven't signed it.”

"That is because I do not wish my beuefactions known to the world," said Mr. Munu, modestly. "I wish to give the check anonymously." And he bowed the ladies qut with great dignity. WILLIAM HENRY SIVITER.