The Lake County star., 1876-07-06
MINOR TOPICS.

MINOR TOPICS.
JANE G. SwIssHELM, the belligerent
critic of everything and champion of the
chemiloon, carefully inspected the
steamer on which she went to England
and sends back the following terrifying
news: "The entire inside of ship is a
mass of light pine boards as dry as they
can be kept, and most of them saturated
and thickly coated with oil and paint
and varnish."
Miss MULoCK mentions four profess
sional pursuits in which women can now
support themselves in England-teach-
ing, painting or sculpture, literature, and
public entertainment. In America we
have added the medical profession to the
list, as has been done also in France.
The University of Michigan and some
other institutions graduate few lawyers
also each year.
QUITE sensation has been caused in
Belgium by the extremely rare occur
renee of fatal duel there. Each of the
combatants was to fire two shots; Lieu
tenant M, attached to the War Office at
Brussels, fred his first shot in the air;
Captain H., of the Fourteenth Regi-
ment of the Line, fired twice and missed
his antagonist, who thereupon lodged
his second bullet in his adversary's
heart, and gave himself up to the au-
thorities.
NEAR Poughkeepsie, New York, is a
cottonwood or swamp poplar tree, re-
Gently felled, which measured one hun
dred and twenty-five feet in height, six
feet two inches in diameter two feet from
the ground, where it was cut off four
feet and six inches in diameter thirty
feet from the ground, and each of its
larger limbs was large tree in itself. Its
rings show it to have been only sixty
five years old, and the person by whom
it was transplanted is said to be now
living.
FROM Red River to the coast, and
from the Sabine to the uttermost parts of
Western Texas, the crops are splendid.
A gentlemen who has been making a
tour through Eastern and Northern
Texas says that everything in the crop
line looks luxuriant, and in Middle Texas
he had seen field of oats that was ex-
pected to average hundred bushels to
the acre. Western Texas speaks of her
self as being blessed with fine crop pros
poets, and our coast countries, with the
richest soil on earth, are covered with
cotton, cane and corn of such ap-
pearance as to almost insure an unusual |
yield.
THERE appears to be Turkish un-
pleasantness in Jerusalem. The naughty |
Turk is bullying the Christian popula-
tion and barricading mas commenced.
The population in Jerusalem is about |
twenty thousand, and the Turks only |
number six thousand, the Jews eight |
thousand, and the Christians the balance.
The Pasha who. resides there is subject
to the Governor-General of Syria. 1t
would seem within the range of posi-
bility for the Christians and Jews to |
unite and administer severe fogging to
the Musselmans; in fact, there never was
a better time for revolution, as Sultan
Murad has his hands full with the for
midable rebellion in European Turkey.
A CURIOUS character lately died at
Nice. This was the Count Eugenio
Spitalieri di Cessole, for time tbe'pupil
and afterwards the intimate friend of
Paganini. He entertained SO great an
admiration for the violinist that he |
treasured up as precious relic bow
with which the "King of the Fiddle"
executed in Vienna some of his most
curious fantasies. In 1868 rich Eng
lishman, we are informed, offered the
Count four hundred pounds for the bow,
but he refused. In 1865, the same rich
Englishman, according to the same
undoubted authority, offered him twice
as much. The Count refused. After his
death it was found that he had be-
queathed the bow to Verdi.
AN accident, described as being of ca
rather alarming character" occurred
lately at Monkbridge Ironworks, in
England. 1t seems that disused cannons
are purchased by the company to which
the ironworks belong for the purpose of
being melted down. One of these super
animated engines of war having been
put into the refinery it showed its dis
pleasure by "going off" with noise like
thunder. 1t contained, in fact, no fewer
than four balls, each weighing about ten
pounds, and its explosion under these
circumstances was, however incon-
venient, not altogether inexcusable. The
gun. having been placed in the furnace
perpendicularly the charge ascended 10 a
great height, two of the balls piercing
and remaining in large brick chimney
about thirty yards distant. Fortunately
no one was hurt by the salute the old
cannon thus fired in its own honor on
the occasion of its obsequies, but there is
no saying what mischief it might not
have caused had it "spit forth its iron
indignation horizontally instead of per-
pendicularly. As the millennium grad
ually develops itself vast number of
superfuous cannon will, no doubt, be
utilized for afiectionate purposes, and it
would really be advisable, as matter of
prudence, TO examine them thoroughly
before melting them down in furnaces,
as otherwise the Inauguration of uni
.versal peace will probably be attended
byno small amount of danger and death.
DO not be troubled because you have
no great virtues. God made a million