Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1872-05-16
GENERAL NEWS.


GENERAL NEWS.
Several stores and dwellings were burned
at Wallaceburg, Ontario, Sunday night. Loss
$4,000.
There was fearful hailstorm at Salt Lake
City Monday afternoon, doing great damage
to the fruit blossoms.
Judge Nathan Clifford of the Supreme
Court has just received $500 income tax re-
funded, having been illegally collected on his
salary.
One hundred and fifty feet of the path
of the Erie Cana gave way on Saturday, 20
feet below the canal bottom at big Nose. 1t
will take about 10 days for repairs.
There was more fires the last week in New
York than have been known for year past,
and the aggregate loss is estimated at $3,000,-
600.
In Oatka Falls, Kansas, the farmers wives
have organized club, and meet regularly at
one anothers houses, and discuss various
topics relating to domestic economy.
Considerable interest is manifested through
out the country in the trial of earth-working
implements to take place at Springfield, Ohio,
on the 18th of June. Entries have been made
from all parts of the country.
An association, to produce and develop the
new staple, ramie, has been formed in New
Orleans. The members claim that they pos
sess the secret of thoroughly cleansing and
preparing the fiber.
Mr. Thomas Scott, President of the Penn
sylvania Central Railroad, is also President
of twenty-six other railroads. He controls
seven thousand miles of railroad, and credits
to his salary account $l7, 900 per annum. He
began railroading as a brakeman.
The Treasury Department decides that the
British steamer Clotlde, having gone to sea
with British papers after having acquired the
right to American registry by shipwreck and
repair, has thereby fortified the privilege.
A case of great destitution was Saturday
discovered in Jersey City. In family Of six
persons the father was found dying with con-
sumption, three children lying ill with the
smallpox, and one child already lying dead
in the house of the disease. The mother was
unable to get food for the living or money to
bury the dead.
An interesting case, illustrating canine
sagacity, occurred in Lawrence day or two
ago. Two little boys, sons of prominent
citizen, were near the banks of the Merrimac
river when the youngest fell in. The older
boy plunged in to save him, but was unable
to do SO, and became exhausted. A large
Newfoundland dog, belonging to the father of
the boys, went to the rescue and first bring
turned and saved the older boy.
Ex-senator George c. Bestor of Illinois,
who died in Washington Sunday, has been
there ever since the war endeavoring to col
lect pay for monitor built at st. Louis for
the government during the rebellion. A short
time since Senator Cragin reported bill for
his relief, appropriating $4,000, but no
action was taken upon it, and Mr.. Bestor died
of broken heart and was buried by charity.
One of our correspondents visited the drum
factory of Woodman and Williams at Farm
ington Falls, Maine, the other day and saw
the big drum which they have made for the
Jubilee. He thinks it great trial of faith to
believe such thing can be drum, but,
granting such to be the case, he says, 1t is in
deed colosseum and deserves to be set down
as the eighth wonder of the world. Of bass
drums in common use forty inches is the
ultimum diameter; and the dimension of the
one that played its part in the Jubilee of go
was but eight feet; but the size of this is as
much greater as the Jubilee of 1872 is supe-
rior to that of 1869, for its dimensions are
diameter twelve feet, circumference thirty
seven feet eight inches, width five feet. Man
utactured of maple, it required twelve boards
each fifteen feet in length and thirteen inches
In width, and so contains one hundred and
ninety five square feet 1t is the largest drum
IN the world, and, so far as known, is the !
largest that has ever been manufactured, so |
large in fact, that toeemove it from the build
ing where it has been made it will be necessary
to tear away the wall for some distance. Its
transportation by rail is Of course impossible
the tops of bridges and passing trains would