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Show l 17 - A Famous Midget. - "y fj-il - f x i 'jVjV JIrs. Gen. Tom Thumb, who has just ii I'L p ' iww1' tt arrived in New York from Europe, is j. ; I " "'' 'ne most famous midget in the world VWH 1 ' and has been such for forty years, il ifflr " the single exception of her late hus- ;5''00",?,?X band be allowed. She is now ,th " Ta 4 Countess Magri, and is accompanied fSSZ ' oy ber second husband, whose stature A Famous Midget. Mrs. Gen. Tom Thumb, who has just arrived in New York from Europe, is the most famous midget in the world and has been such for forty years, il the single exception of her late husband hus-band be allowed. She is now ,th Countess Magri, and is accompanied by her second husband, whose stature is about the same as that of his cele-i cele-i brated spouse. The countess was a Miss Bump of Mid-lleborough, Mid-lleborough, Mass. She met Charles S. Stratten (Gen. Tom Thumb) at the house of P. T. Bar-num Bar-num in 1858, and married him In 1861. This little pair traveled over A Gigantic TasK. I Finished. The final volume of the biggest literary lit-erary work ever undertaken and executed exe-cuted in the wqrld, dealing with the American civil war, the greatest conflict con-flict of arms in all history, has just been completed at the government printing office in Washington. The title of the work is "War of the Rebellion: Rebel-lion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies." It consists of 128 huge royal octavo volumes of 1.000 pages each, and in addition a gigantic atlas in thirty-five parts. The publication was begun twenty-six years ago and has proceeded uninterruptedly since. The distribution of the volumes as public documents has gone on for eighteen years. Many of the persons to whom they were furnished at first have died. all the world, and Coimtess Magri. were received ev-, erywhere. They met Abraham Lin-coln.the Lin-coln.the Prince andPrincess of WTales, Emperor Napoleon, the Empress Eugenie, Eu-genie, Gen. Sherman, Admiral Porter, , Gen. Grant, John Wilkes Booth, a. few presidents of the United States, and J. several Oriental princes. . . , Mrs. Thumb was first exhibited at Barnum's Museum in New York.' In 1865 she and the general- went abroad and were received by Queen Victoria at Windsor. They were afterwards' engaged by companies of liliputians for the stage. The countess is now 60t but as youthful in spirit as she was forty years ago. "Rear Admiral K.empff. Rear Admiral Kempff has just been relieved of command of the American fleet in Chinese waters. Just previous to the combined assault of Europe's warships on the Taku forts, the admirals ad-mirals held a council coun-cil for the purpose of deciding what course to take. Admiral Ad-miral Kempff on behalf of the United States argued against a-ault,say-ing that it would result in the massacre mas-sacre of everv mis- GEN. AINSWORTH. and many of the libraries'originally designated to receive them have disbanded, dis-banded, leaving a great quantity of odd volumes still undistributed. So now, to utilize these, and give to the public an opportunity to procure sets of the work, the secretary of war is authorized by a provision in the- Sundry Sun-dry Civil act passed at the recent session ses-sion of Congress to complete and furnish fur-nish to each senator and representative representa-tive of Congress two full sets for free distribution among their constituents. ' In December, 1898, when the original origi-nal board that had charge of the publication pub-lication was dissolved the work was turned over to Brigadier General F. C. Ainsworth, chief of the Record and Pension Office of the War Department Depart-ment for early completion. Under his efficient administration the work has greatly been accelerated, and happily sionary in China. Admiral Kempff. When the other admirals ad-mirals decided to tight he withdrew the American squadron and looked on. He has been succeeded by Admiral Rqmey. Grand Old Li. Li Hung Chang has been called a great statesman, but Henry Norman, FnirliKh correspondent, declares - that he is an arch humbug, and there is a large range for speculation between these two extremes of opinion. Still, we know more about this old viceroy than we do about any other Chinese. The people of the United States have a kindly regard for the old viceroy. He, has even been the warm friend ot this country. A few days ago he said to an American correspondent: "Whatever the outcome of this war it will not mar the friendly relations between my country and yours, Ad- now nmsnect, except tne mere pnnuus of the final volumes. May 15aboo Astor. William Waldorf Astor's recent paragraph in his paper, the Pall Mall Gazette, saying that Sir Berkeley Milne of the Naval and Military Club, Piccadilly, formerly commander of the royal yacht Osborne and a well-known well-known clubman, attended a concert at his home' without an invitation, is 'making a great commotion in London society, and threatens to seriously affect af-fect Mr. Astor's position. It seems that Captain Milne was dining at- the house of a well known woman, who asked him to go with her party to the Astor concert. This is daily done in London, and Sir Berkeley Milne unhesitatingly un-hesitatingly accepted. On arriving, Hr, Astor. instead of shaking hands asked the latter his name. Milne told him and said that Lady brought him with her party. Mr. Astor replied that pleasure of his ac-q ac-q u a 1 ntance, requested re-quested him to leave and added Ml . ' LI HUNG CHANG, mlral Kempff's refusal- to join in the assault on our forts at Taku shows that he clearly understands the situation." Lovier Cable Bates. There are now thirteen cable lines across the Atlantic in successful operation, op-eration, yet the charge for sending messages mes-sages remains what it has been for twenty years or more 25 cents a word for commercial messages and 10 cents -a word for press dispatches. In that period the laud telegraph rates hve been lowered, as have also the postal rates and -railway charges for freight and passengers. Ocean cable rates flone remain as high as they were nearly a quarter of a century ago, im spite of the fact that the number of m-tssages is now at least five times as great as when the rates were established. es-tablished. ' Mr. Astor. that he would Insert In-sert a notice in the newspapers. Sir Berkeley retired in confusion and from the Naval and Military club the same night sent Mr. Astor a letter of apology and expressed express-ed the hope that he would allow the matter to drop. In spite of this Mr. Astor, in his paper the next afternoon inserted, as cabled to New York at the time, the following paragraph: "We are desired to make known that the presence of Captain Sir Berkeley Milne of the Naval and Military club, Piccadilly, Picca-dilly, at Mr. Astor's concert last Thursday .evening was uninvited." Captain, Milne's many Influential friends, who include the Duke of York, are furious, the Duke and other naval officers regarding Mr. Astor's conduct as an insult to their profession as well as to a personal friend. |