Senator Palmer Says He Has Not Yet

deciued to accept the Bpamsh mission; bat the probalilities are that he will do The Poutiac asylum investigating ommittee are at work. Of course their -report will satisfy only a certain peroentageof their constituentejbutitistobe hoped they will lean to the 8ide of the poor patients in this affair.and thatjustice will be done them. The legislators -hould, as it were, put themselves in ihe asylum patients' places - and in that eventsomeof them might not have far to travel. Many leading medical and educaüonil men are enthusiastically endorsing 3lepie6entative Jackson's bill prohibiting cigarette smoking. If thia cruel bill shonld pass, how in the name of "fine-cut" will the average dude, denied the stimulating aid of his cigarette, be able to part his hair exactly in the middle, spread to the favoring breezes bis broad pantaloons, and steer himself down to Fred'. Brown's with his fivepound hickory? Down with Jackson! ín a recent number, Science called attention to the danger to which travelIers on ocean steamers are Kubjected when their stateroom companions happen to be consuinptives. That this danger is not an imaginary one seems to be demoiistrated by an incident which recently occurred in France. A French physkian, Dr.Gautier by name, has been investigaling the question ■whether tuberculogis may be communi:ated by means of its bacilli. That this is possible for lowers animáis has been thoroughly proved. Dr. Gautier has himself fallen a victini to the disease, having becotne infected from the pulverized tuberculous sputum with which he was experimenting, thus showing that the disease is equally communica. able to man. Pkesident Harkison's grandfather was the oldest of all our presidenta, but it is doubtful if any cabinet ever contained so many mature men as the new one, lts average age is fifty-seven years and five months. The President himself is fifty-five, four yeare older than his predecessors. Mr. Windom is sixty-two, Mr. Blaine, Gov. Rusk and Mr. Tracy, fifty-nine; Gov. Proctor, fifty-eigbt, Mr. Noble fifty-eeven. Mr. Wanamaker is üfty-two and Mr. Miller forty-eight. Mr. Cleveland sought youngish men for hia advisers. Gen. Grant, youngest of all the presidenta, folio wed the same rule. Gen. Harrison's cabinet as a body iscomposedof robust.practical men.capable of doing a large amount of official work without the strain and nervous wear and tear that broke down many of their more youthful predecessors, notably those in Mr. Cleveland's cabinet. ________ The election which took place in the Kensington district in England, March 15, to fill the seat made vacant by theenforced resignation of the Tory embezzler, Robert Gent-Davis, was attended by greater excitement among the electora than has characterized auy previous bye-election in many years. The campaign was fought entirely upon national issues and resulted in a victory for Mr. Beaufoy, the Gladstonian candidate, who polled 4,069 votes, against 3,439 for Mr. Hope, the Cnservative nominee. The result affords the country absolutely certain proof of the popular drift of opinión, and indicates, as nearly as can be ascertained, the effect which " Pigottism " and other recent Tory exploits have had upon the minds of the people. Mr. Beaufoy, the Liberal candidate, wbo was also the Gladstenian candidate at the previous election, when GentDavis beat hitn by a vote of 3,222 to 2,792, had a slight advantage in the fact that he is a large local employer of labor, but as the same conditions prevailed on the occasion of his defeat the revulsión of popular feeling rather than any other consideration carried hirn through and adds another seat to the number wrested from the Conservatives bythe Gladstonianswithin the past year. Hugh McCurdy, a prominent Shiawasse county attorney, and ex-member of the legislature, now sojourning in California, writes that in proportion to its population California has more dependent children supported out of its state treasury than any other community of which there is any public record - the proportion being in California one to every 250 of population, and in Michigan one to every 10,000 - offers good advice to citizens of Michigan who may contémplate settling in California. After paying tribute to the climate and resources of the Golden state, Mr. McCurdy says: "It is a truism that it is not all gold that glitters. It is true that this Btate lias tbmsands of acres of the choicest land, and it is equally true that it has thousands of acres of land entirely worthless and ever will be. It ia equally true that this state has its millionaires and its paupers, and more paupers according to ils population than any other state, and Michigan has loss. To thofc who believe that it is all gold that glitters and think of selling their snug and cozy little home to come here and get rich, I say, consider well the change and don't undertake it unless you have money to start in business after you get here. If you have money you will find homes to your fancy and climate to youi taste, where your every wish will be satisfled and your desire fulfilled."