The Newtown bee., 1879-08-20
TIMELY TOPICS.

TIMELY TOPICS.
 It is not alone the unripe fruit exposed for sale on curbstone stands in the city that makes work for the doctors and the undertakers. Hanging on the bough, with the sunlight fecking it, it is more tempting and not less deadly. Let the country boys and village boys who read this beware of all fruit which is not fully ripe, that their days may be long in the land.
 A German physician has started theory that all food should be eaten raw, as all the nutritive qualities meat and vegetables possess are in great measure, if not entirely, destroyed by cooking. Persons afflicted with gout, rheumatism, or indigestion are advised to try uncooked food, such as oysters and fruit, and they will find all medi- cines unnecessary.
 The Lancaster Pa.) NesUs Era, in an article on the beet-sugar enterprise in America, says: "WhateveT the result of the present experiment in New England, it is certain that sooner or later the making of sugar from beets will become as general in this country as in France, Germany and Austria. Should such a bounty as is now paid to the codfishing interest be extended to that of beet-sugar, no doubt a few years would put it on such a solid basis that after while, a1thnJJrh tho ,iy,c people in the world, we would virtually shake off our dependence on foreign sugar markets"
 The Ka1ssas Farmer publishes valua- bic article on the nature and ravages of hog cholera in this country, a disease which carries off annually more than $20,000,000 worth of swine, and yet about which legislators and citizens generally exhibit the most profound in- difference. And yet it may be controlled and checked by just the same means that stamped out the cattle plague in England the slaughtering of every animal ex- hibiting symptoms of the disease and the removal and quarantining of those that have been exposed. By this means alone can herds be freed from this ter rible scourge.
 The worlds supplies of gold, which twenty years ago were upward of S200,- 0OO,0OO a year. fell to $96, 6,5O0, GOO in 1877, and $83, 800, ,OOO in 1878. During the current year. it is believed, they will scarcely exceed S7O,oOO,OOO. Cali fornia, Australia and Nevada have sue cessively been the great gold producing countries of the world. Now, strangely enough, Russia has assumed the front rank. The product of the entire Pacific coast for 1879 will not exceed SIG, ,OOO, ,O0O to-. Sl9000,0O0, and of Australia SIS, = 000,000, while the gold crop of Rus sia, which was $l9,000000 in 1877, and 18,OOO,000 in 1878, is expected in 1879 to exceed $20,000, ,00O.
 The discovery of the heirs of Mrs. Jane Howard, an eccentric old lady who died at Washington last May possessed of considerable property, was accom- plished through an advertisement for next of kin published in a New York paper. Mrs. Towards story was a singular one. She had lived the life of a recluse in Washington, telling fortunes appal ently for 8 living and denying her self almost the necessaries of life. Sud- denly she disappeared, and after several days the door of her miserable shanty was broken open by the police and the woman's dead body was found on the l bed, partially devoured by rats. Then came the discovery of her ownership of valuable building lots ill the most fash ionable portion of the capital and the 1 advertisement for the heirs.
 l Speaking of the hygienic effects of sea and mountain air a celebrated Italian physician says: ''The marine air produces the same benefit as that of the mountain, but each has different naodas ebfciendi; the former acts more forcibly and ener- 1 getically on the constitution which re- tains some robustness and internal re- sources to profit by it, while the second acts more gently, with slower efficacy, being therefore more suitable to the weaker and less excitable organizations. From this important distinction the con- scientious physician, who takes the safety of his patient much to heart, ought to be able to discriminate whether the alpine or the marine atmosphere is the better suited to the case he has before him."
 The Binghamton (N. Y.) Republican gives the following account of 8 very strange effect of lightning on the body of a boy who was recently killed in a thun- der storm: After Jimmy Stevens, the boy killed by lightning on Tuesday, was taken home, and while the corpse was being prepared by the undertaken for burial, 9 picture resembling a photo graph of butternut limb came out on his back very distinctly and stayed there. 1 It is certain that this print Was unon his