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Show CURIO U SCOLDMBUS. " The Wonderful and Intricate Manner in Which He Siped His Name. A MEMORY FEOM THE PLAINS. The Old Adam-A Conductor's Hard Life -A Bit of the Middle Ages. ' Of the sixty odd millions of people in the United States all except nn insignificant insignifi-cant portion of the "odds' have heard or read the wonderful story pf Columbus and his discoveries. It is doubtful, however, how-ever, if sixty odd thousand of this vast aggregation ever saw a copy of tho curious curi-ous signature used by tho discoverer of the Americas. In his will the great Christopher says: "My heirs shall sign only with an S -with an X under it, and an M with a Roniau A over it, and over than are S and a great Y with nn S over it; with its lines and points as is my custom ho shall only write 'The Admiral,' Ad-miral,' whatever title the king may have conferred upon him." , Tho usual fonin of this signature, with "its lines and points" as mentioned in tho will, was as follows: .S. .S. A .R. X M Y Xpo FERENS El Amirante Why the periods were used at the sides of the Ss and not before and following the other letters has been the subject of much discussion. The initials in a straight line are "8. S. A. S. X. M. Y.," which Professor Becher, recalling the fact that it was to Isabella or Ysabella that Columbus owed his chances of carrying car-rying out his plans, reads them as: "Serv-iador "Serv-iador Sus Altesa Sacras Jesus Maria Isabel." Which would be about as follows fol-lows if translad into good United States English:, "The servant of their sacred highnesses Jesus Mary and Isabel." Isa-bel." The last line Professor Dewitt translates as "Christ Bearing (Christopher) (Christo-pher) the Admiral." St. Louis Republic. A Memory from tho Flulna. I saw a girlish looking woman holding her husband's arm as both stood enjoying enjoy-ing the gorgeous spectacle on the platform plat-form in the Madison Square garden the other night. I could not help conjecturing conjectur-ing what a flood of memories would have risen to her mind had some one rushed into the amphitheatre and shouted tho single word "Injuns!" The couple were an army officer and his wife, and, though you may not all know ithat means that more than once he has been pledged to shoot her at an instant's notice. It is the rule the humane haw on our plains that when the savages are on the warpath and a husband and wife are traveling in their country the husband shall kill the wife the moment it becomes be-comes evident that she must otherwise fall into the hands of the redskins. Terrible Ter-rible as it is to think of slaying your wife (and only fancy what noble women those wives out there must be) no man would hesitate if he knew that by doing so he could save her from indignities that make death at once a trifle and a joy-Fancy joy-Fancy the situation if you can put yourself in such a place. . As yon ride through the wilderness, perhaps with a guard of cavalry or only as part of a wagon train, tha declaration of war comes with a rattle of rifle shots from some rocks or grove ahead. Every spur is pressed home, every horse leaps forward, for-ward, every gun is seen to, and- your wife reins in beside you and says: "Now, remember! 1 rely on you." Aftor that one would imngino a ballet in New York would seem quite tame. 1 Chatter. |