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The Abbeville Press.
By W. A. Lee and Hugh Wilson. 
Abbeville, S. C., Friday, October 2, 1868
Volume XVI-No.23.

POLICY VS. PLATFORM.

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY AND THE NEGRO STATE GOVERNMENTS - WILL CONGRESSIONAL RECONSTRUCTION STAND, OR BE SWEPT AWAY? -- WHAT THE NEW YORK WORLD SAYS.

Under the heading, "A Frank Answer to an Insidious question," a very significant leading editorial appears in the New York World of Tuesday last. The World is the most prominent and influential of the Democratic organs at the North, and is understood to reflect the views of those who will shape the policy of the Democratic party in the event of its success in November. The position which it has taken differs very widely from what very many Southern Democrats have conceived to be the aims and publicly declared intentions of the National Democracy, and, as faithful chronicles of political events, we, therefore, place the statement of the World before our readers. The article to which we refer was in reply to the following paragraphs which appeared in the New York Times, of Wednesday last:

According to the policy thus authoritatively proclaimed, it will be incumbent on Mr. Seymour, if elected, to set aside the new governments as null and void, and with the help of the military to disperse them and re-establish the order of things which Congress abolished. This programme involves the forcible destruction of governments organized under the law, and whose validity Congress has recognized, the overthrow of constitutions which have been ratified by a majority of the people, the disfranchisement of the freedmen in defiance of existing law, and the restoration to power of rebel leaders in spite of the disability imposed by the fourteenth amendment. *  *  *  *  *

Will the World give its opinion frankly touching the practical application of the Blair doctrine as to the dispersion of the Southern governments and the disfranchisement of the freedmen by the mere order of a Democratic President? Will it explain how it reconciles its professed respect for law, and its acknowledgment of the de facto authority of the new governments, with its support of candidates who are pledged to defy and violently to overthrow both?

To which "insidious question" the World makes "frank answer" as follows:

This strain of remark and request for information proceed upon the unwarranted assumption that General Blair's letter is a part of the Democratic platform. But supported by the public opinion of the whole country, as the Southern whites will be by the election of the Democratic candidates, they will have no difficulty in revising the present constitutions by methods so free from legal question, that no federa interference will be possible to thwart and none necessary to aid them.

We are confirmed in this view by the fact that the ingenuity of the Times itself can descry no other remedy than a refusal to admit senators and representatives from the States which thus transform their governments. In an article on the 11th inst., upon the expulsion of the negroes from the Georgia Legislature, the Times said: 

How the wrong may be remedied is a question we are not disposed to answer with the same degree of confidence. It is a difficult and delicate question. The House has a right to decide upon the election and qualification of its members, and no State Court has jurisdiction over it. An adverse judgment may be announced, but the prominent advocates of expulsion have announced their intention to disregard it. They claim to be judges of law as well as of fact, and will need no opinion or decision at variance with their action. What, then, can Congress do? May not the Senate and House in turn assert their supreme control over elections and qualifications, and respectively refuse to admit the senators and representatives whom Georgia will sent to the next session? The inquiry is not extravagant in view of the fact that Georgia regained its privilege of self-government, in part, by ratifying the fourteenth amendment, which, without that vote, would still be law. The act  of ratification, however, in the Georgia house, was carried by the votes of the colored members who have been expelled as ineligible. If they had no lawful title to seats they could have none to votes; and after striking them off, the motion to ratify becomes a failure. Interpreting the action of the Legislature in respect of the amendment in the light of its recent proceeding, no special pleading would seem necessary to justify revision by Congress on the ground of fraud. For if what purported to be a ratification was really not such, admission obtained in reliance upon it was in fact admission by false pretences; and Congress may vindicate its integrity and punish the fraud by refusing to receive the Georgia senators and representatives. That step would virtually be a declaration that the reconstruction of the State is still incomplete.

Now, whatever may be thought of this remedy in other respects, the Times must [[line or lines missing at bottom of page?]]

messages, uniformly applauded by the Democratic party, have held up the Radical measures as revolutionary violations of the constitution. This doctrine did not originate with Wade Hampton ; it did not originate with the South ; it has been, from the firs, the spontaneous, settled, universal belief of the whole Democratic party. If it had not appeared in the platform in the words suggested by Wade Hampton, it would have been introduced in some other words ; for it has been the constant sentiment of the party on that subject.

The only pertinent inquiry is, whether the Times' interference is well drawn ; whether, in other words, a declaration that the Reconstruction acts are "unconstitutional, revolutionary and void," pledges the party to disperse the new governments by force. It is an accepted principle of logic that an argument which proves too much proves nothing. If the reasoning of the Times proves that its editor is pledged to abet the overthrow of the Radical policy by force, he will perhaps recoil from his own conclusions, and admit that his formidable inference is ill drawn.

The World then addresses the editor of the Times, Mr. H. J. Raymond, in a powerful argermentum ad hominum, reminding him of the strong protest which he himself drew up against the Reconstruction acts, and which was adopted by the Philadelphia Convention, and contrasting his positions then and now. The World then concludes as follows:

But we need no assistance from the Philadelphia address to confute the pretence that the Democratic party is pledged to destroy the new State governments by force. There is not only nothing of the kind in the platform, but nothing which can bear that construction in the action of the Southern people. Wade Hampton himself is trying to carry his own State for Seymour and Blair through the agency of the carpet-bag government. Everybody knows what has been done in Georgia. In all the reconstructed States they are attempting to effect a change by political action which recognizes the usurping governments de fact, while denying their validity dejure. The example of Georgia demonstrates that this peaceful method of will be successful if endorsed by the public opinion of the country in the Presidential election. No force will be resorted to -- none will be necessary. The same majority which suffices to get control of the present State governments will also suffice to alter the State constitutions. With a Democratic President and House of Representatives [[one or more lines missing at the bottom of the page]]

Why can not Fowls be kept in Large Flocks?

It is pretty generally conceded that no one is successful who attempts to keep together a large number of fowls, and that those who keep the smallest number together generally obtain the greatest proportionate number of eggs. And this is, we think, not only true, but easily accounted for.

Every one who has kept fowls knows that they are very uncleanly birds. They even wash themselves in the dirt, and that evidently not for the purpose of cleanliness, but to rid themselves of vermin. They prefer clean light sand, because if in the sun it is generally warmer, and is easily moved, but they seem equally to enjoy any soft, dry earth, although it may not be very sweet and clean. They are notoriously filthy in their coops, roosting under each other, taking no pains to avoid the droppings, soiling their food, water and nests with their droppings, and doing no act apparently towards cleanliness. This is more manifest in the house where they are confined, and where the air should be as pure as possible. If they are at large and few in number, they move around so much that they can not sour the ground. They are by nature clean, but by habit the reverse, and the only way to keep them in the natural state, ss to give them range enough, so that they can not soil their haunts, or else cleanse their haunts carefully and faithfully every day.

We once kept one solitary hen on our place for several months. She was of the common barn yard breed. We never saw a healthier fowl, or whose feathers kept so fresh and perfect, and she was a conttant layer. No care was taken of her, and we always attributed her thrift to the fact that she had the whole range of our place for exercise and her quarters were always perfectly clean.

As soon as your flock becomes large you will find them crowding together and always souring their haunts, if there are a sufficient number of them to do it. You may do something towards preventing this, but you can not keep very large flocks very clean.

We have often seen it stated that no more than fifty hens should be kept in a hen-house twenty feet by ten. Except with constant care and [[Line or lines missing at the bottom of the page}}

THE PEACHES
A countryman brought from the city five peaches, the finest that ever were seen. But his children saw this fruit for the first time. Therefore they wondered and rejoiced in the pretty peaches with their red cheeks and delicate down. The father then divided them among his four boys and gave one to their mother.

In the evening, when the children went to their sleeping chamber, the father asked: "Well, and how did the pretty peaches taste?"

"Finely, dear father," said the oldest. "It is a beautiful fruit - so tartish and delicate in taste. I have carefully kept the stone, and I will raise a tree from it."

"Bravo," said the father ; "that is providing economically for the future as becomes a landsman."

"I ate mine at once," the youngest cried, "and threw away the stone, and mother gave me half of her's. Oh, it tasted so sweet, and melted in my mouth."

"Well," said the father, "you have not acted very wisely, but naturally, and in a child's manner. For wisdom there is yet room in the course of your life."

Then the second son began : "I hunted up the stone which my little brother threw away, and cracked it. There was a seed in it that tasted as [[obscured]]. But my peach I sold for enough, when I go to hte city, that I can probably buy twelve."

The father shook his head, and said:
"That is wise enough, but child-like and natural it was not. Heaven guard you that you do not become a merchant."

"And you, Edmund?" asked the father.

Self-possessed and frank, Edmund replied: "I carried my peach to our neighbor George, who was sick of a fever. He would not take it; then I laid it upon his bed, and came away."

"Well," said the father who has made the best use of his peach?"

All three exclaimed, "Brother Edmund!" But Edmund was silent, and his mother embraced him with tears in her eyes.


A LITTLE MISSION GIRL.
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Printing of the Bible.

During the reign of Henry VIII., and in the year 1538, a celebrated printer named Grafton undertook to print the great Bible in England, but owing to a lack of a sufficient number of workmen and types, he was under the necessity of transferring the work to France, which he did, and commenced operations in the city of Paris. Such an attempt was, however, inimical to the teachings and wishes of the Romish Church of that country, and he was stopped from proceeding with what they termed a heretical book. Determined not to be deterred from accomplishing his great design, he procured presses, type, printers and bookbinders, and returned with them to England, where he finished the work in the year 1539, which has contributed so much to the knowledge and the happiness of mankind. The first edition consisted of about 2,500 copies, and each church in England was supplied with a copy, which was kept secured to a desk by a chain.

You would doubtless be surprised upon visiting one of our churches, to find that the Holy Bible was chained to the pulpit or desk, and so would any one at the present day ; but not so then, for very few people, save monks and priests, had ever seen a Bible before, and a still fewer number had been allowed to peruse it. Consequently it was in one sense even more precious than it is at the present time, and, in order to prevent its being stolen and destroyed by those who were opposed to its general use by the people, or mutilated by careless and indiscreet persons, of whom all were not actuated by desires other than those prompted by idle curiosity and vanity, it was necessary to keep it within the church, and under the watchful care of the church officers.

Seven similar editions of this work were issued within three years amounting to something near 17,500 volumes.

As a necessary consequence, this amount of work furnished emplyement to a great number of binders, and rendered the art of binding one of considerable importance at that period. The king himself had many of the volumes bound in velvet, surmounted with gold ornaments, and it is believed that during his reign the [[one or more lines cut off at bottom of page]]


CHEERFULNESS.
An old an a very common objection to the Christian religion is, that it is unsuited to the natural buoyancy and cheerfulness of youth to the vigor and enterprise of manhood and to infirm old age alike. Some admit that it has its present pleasures and its promises of future bliss, but deny that these compensate for the loss of the worldly enjoyments of this life: and therefore that they are either misguided or fanatical who seek the pleasures of the Spirit and of faith at the sacrifice of the pleasures of sense and of sight. But in nothing of the spiritual life has the natural mind so misconceived as in this direction, (1 Cor. 2: 14; 1 Tim. 4: 8; and Ps. 97: 11.) Certain ascetics and some gloomy pietists have placed restrictions upon the lawful enjoyments of the world, until they cast a cloud of gloom around religion instead of using it5 to crown them as with a halo of light and beauty. It is in this way that many, and especially those of youthful years, have been terrified with religion instead of being attracted by it.

These self-righteous religionists divorce religion from the world and deprive her from working out one great feature of her mission, which was no to abolish, but to reform and sanctify the proper enjoyments of secular life, and thus to make the relations of domestic and social life and the operations of literature, science and art the friends and aids of religion rather than her enemies.

Cheerfulness ought not to be confounded with mirth, as these men of austere principles do, and who back their ascetic views with the observation that Jesus, "the great pattern of perfection, was never seen to laugh!"

Mirth is the outgushing of momentary and mostly of unlawful joy, and then may leave the soul to sink into the deepest melancholy! Cheerfulness is the slower but more constant flowing of a stream supplied by the equanimity of mind or the conscious integrity of soul which belong to the virtuous and holy. Cheerfulness is but another expression for the serenity of soul Jesus had and which breathes from his [[obscured word]] in the gospels, the Divine Artist [[ 1 - 2 words obscured]] laughter although there is no record [[1-2 words obscured]] connected with it.


A New Cure for Fevers. -- A Parisian apothecary is making a little stir just now with a medicinal preparation of tar, known as tar-water, which he has introduced, and which, from the definite quantity of the curative principle that it contains, promises to be very useful to the doctors. These is no quakory in the article: tar-water has been known for more than a century ; and the reason of my mentioning the above fact is, that it affords a peg whereon to hang a story illustrative of accidental discoveries. When Bishop Berkeley was on his Rhode Island expedition, his ship was becalmed for several days in mid-ocean and a terrible epidemic broke out among the crew. Some of the sick were place in the hold of the vessel, and burning with thirst, a few of them actually drank the bilge water, which was impregnated with tar. Strange to say, those who drank recovered from the fever. Berkely, gifted, as Pope said, with "every virtue under heaven," was, of course, far-sighted, and soon saw that the tar was the healing agent; so he drank the water himself, and avoided the contagion. When he returned to Britain, he set about experimenting with the specific, and having satisfied himself of its real efficacy, published several tracts extolling its virtues. The matter was taken up by the pharmacists; tar-water was subjected to comment and discussion, and febrile patients were subjected to tar-water.


A Cat Charmed by a Snake. -- The Pensacola Observer tells the following snake story: "A young lady living in the city had a valued cat, and a day or two since, losing sight of it for an unusual length of time, was induced to make search for the missing pet. In a short time, to her surprise, she discovered the truant under the shade of a shrub, with a snake coiled around its body. The reptile stretching forth its pliant neck, and curving it to the position of a vis-a-vis, held the charmed feline spell bound. The neighbours -- several in number -- were summoned to behold the scene. Finally, a lad seized the snake by the tail, and placing a forked stick on its head, uncoiled his folds from around the cat. This done, both the cat and snake lay with their gaze fastened upon each other, nor was the charm broken until the serpent died. [[Word obscured]]