The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1879-07-05
Compiled for Tie Democratic Adgoeale.

Compiled for the Democratic Advoeate.
Aessrs. Editors IL have taken con-
iderable time and pains to look up the
ollowing interesting matter-facts worthy
o be remembered by all your readers. O.
A single house fly produces in one sea
ION 20,000,320. Some female spiders
produce nearly 1000 eggs. DR.. Bright
published case Of an egg producing an
insect 80 years after il must have been
aid. A wasps nest usually contains
$1,000 or 10000 cells. The Atlantic
Ocean is estimated at three miles, and the
Pacific four miles deep There are six or
seven generations Of gnats in summer,
and each lays 260 eggs. There are about
y 900 cells in n square foot Of honey comb.
. 900 bees weigh pound. The bones of
birds are hollow and filed with air instead
of marrow. Fish are common 10 the seas
Of Surinam with four eyes; two Of them
on horns grow on the top Of their heads
Capt. Beaufort saw near Smyrna, in 1881,
a cloud of locusts 46 miles long, and 800
yards deep, containing as he calculated,
l69 billions, With view to collect their
webs for silk, 1000 spiders were once
obtained, but they soon killed each other.
Manufacturers and war never thrive to- |
gether
The sun is 100000 time as large as this
earth The sun is 400 times as far off as
the moon. A lady who weighs 100
pounds here would weigh 2700 if on the
surface Of the sun. The heat given off by
the sun would melt 297 200, 900 cubic
miles of ice every second. The diameter
of the earth bears the same relation to its
distance from the sun as the breadth ofa hair
to l25 feet. A rilroad train travelling
without stops at the rate Of forty miles an
hour would get to the sun in 2G3 years, The
stars are supposed to average larger than
our sun and to have planetary systems like
his. The nearest star is 100000 times as
far of as our sun. 1t takes light eight
minutes to come from the sun, but it must
have required $4,000 years to come from
the farthcst visible stars The earth is
flying around the sun at the rate of 900
miles a minute. The sun and all the stars
are moving through space, accompanied
by their planetary systems, at rate vary
ing from 20 to 200 miles second.
Why does the moon look white by day
and yellow by night? A correspondent
of Nature asks this question, saying that
he never heard completely satisfactory
answer to it. If the moons light is 10
reality slightly yellow, the blue atmosphere
Of the daytime would SO neutralize il as
to give the moon its white appearance;
and if twilight is purple, it would Of course
intesify the moderate yellow of the moon.
But neither Of these hypothesis explain
why the moon appears so frequently Of an
extreme yellow color late in the night,
long after twilight has disappeared; nor
why the moon usually looks almoat white
when viewed through a telescope.
The velocity Of electric waves through
the Atlantic cables has been ascertained
by Professor Gould to be from 7 900 to
5000 miles per second Telegraph wires
upon poles in the air conduct the electric
waves with velocity more than double
this, 1t is q curious fact that the rapidity
of the transmission increases with the dis.
tanee between tho wiro aud the earth, or
with the height Of the support The JoT.
nal des Teiegrdphes says that wires placed
upon poles but slightly elevated transmit
signals with velocity Of 10000 miles a
second; and those at a considerable height
give velocity of 10000 or 10000 miles,
The Sanguenay River is one Of tie most
wonderful rivers on the globe. For sixty
| five mile Of its length its depth is from
1000 TO 1900 feet At Cape Trinity it
reaches this enormous depth, while the
rocky shore rises almost perpendicularly to
the height Of nearly 2000 feet-truly
grand and wonderful Some hold the
theory that this mighty gorge was made
by an earthquake, and that it is an arm Of
the sea, although it empties into the
st, Lawrence, nearly three hundred miles
from the sea, or the mouth of the Gulf Of
st. Lawrence.
An INCH OF RAIN-An acre consists
Of 6,272, $40 square inches; and an inch
deep OF rain on an acre amounts to 22,-
622 gallons Of water.
Pure water weighs ten pounds to the
gallon, making triae over l13 net tons
A farmer with 100 acres might receive
from a thunder shower, producing one
ineh Of rain, ! ] 300 tons Of water, and be
extremely thankful for that small favor, if
it happened to fall after long spell of dry
weather.
GoLD IN ANCIENT TIMEs.-Thc con-
tributions Of the people in the time of
David for the Sanctuary, exceeded s34,-
100000. The immense treasure David
is said to have collected for the Sanctuary
amounted to Il l45 millions Of dollars (Crito
says 1890 millions)--a sum greater than
the British National Debt. The gold with
which Solomon oyerlayed the "Mlost Holy
Place, room only 30 feet square,
amounted to more than 1870 million dollars.
LoNoEvrTY,--A Scotch paper notices
an old woman living in GIoslough, who is
100 years of age She never took doc
tors drug in all her life, nor was lancet
ever applied to her frame. She is perfectly
free OF affections of the chest, and during
the last century of her life she has been a
perfect stranger to pain, aud her pulse
does not exceed 20. Her grandfather
died at the age of l29, aud her father died
10 the l20th year of his age.
Fish have great teuacity Of life. II is
believed that the carp has attained the
age Of $50 years, and the pike still great
or age. A pike was caught in lake in
South Germany, in 1897, on which was
found ring bearing this inscription :---"I
l. r n n r a