The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1880-09-17

Inc aggregate cost OF the several
bridges that span the Mississippi rive,
from st. Louis to st. Paul. has been
$50. 573 900, ranging from Sl20,O00 for
the bridge at Prairie du Chen to Sl1,-
573, 900 for that of st. Louis. The annual
tolls upon the merchandise crossing the
river upon these bridges is officially
stated to amount to 50, ,S03, 725, or nearly
Ten and u quarter per cent. upon the
original cost.
Emigration Mt the port OF New York
for the first six months OF 1880 shows
a larger total by $4,000 than at the same
period in 1872, which until now had
stood as the highest figure of the past
twenty-five years. The total for the
past six months is III 600, or more than
three times the number of those who
came during the same period of last
year.
A parliamentary document gives the
certified expenses of members returned
at the last English general election.
The costs, of course, vary according 10
place and circumstances. The lowest
are about 50, 500 in small boroughs.
But some, especially in counties, 70
over $4,000. At the last general elec-
tion, six years ago. tha total cost was
over 81, 500 900, or an average OF 3 | 500
for each one of the $50 members.
A New York paper remarks editori-
ally that "it is a safe prediction that tie
ocean steamship of the future, with its
improved compartment build, its per-
fected code of signals, its electric lights,
its buffers, its apparatus tor deluging a
fire as soon as it shows itself, its i'm
proved lifeboats and RATS, ready for use
al minutes warning, and its thor
oughly-drilled crew, will make our
children wonder at the steamships to
which their rash parents were wont to
intrust their lives"
The st. Louis cremation society has
obtained from Gotha, in Germany. the
plans and specifications OF the colum-
barium and crematory in that citv. The
building and appurtenances cost $22. 900.
and the incineration of thirty bodies las
taken place in it during the past eighteen
months. The columbarium is a build.
ing which receives the urns containing
the ashes. These urns are furnished by
the relatives of the deceased, are thirteen
inches high and fifteen wide, and may
be deposited in the columbarium for
removed. The total cost of cremation
in Gotha Is seven dollars and fifty cents,
and the entire management of the CT =
matory, as well rs the charge of the
columbarium, has been undertaken by
the municipal authorities of that city.
The peculiar season has caused much
havoc in the California peach crop, and
it is quite possible that this fruit will
not be rs successfully grown in that
State in the future as in the past.
Hard seasons for the peach crop are not
peculiar to California alone. Austral-
ian Journals, in speaking OF the peach in
the colony of Victoria, remark that
twenty years ago every one could and
did raise fine peaches. and at slight ex-
pense. But insects and blights of vari-
Gus kinds changed all that, and peach
growing came nearly to an end, except in
highly favored spots. A New Zealand
places where tons of peaches were once
fed to the pigs, trees are dead, dying or
almost lea1ess, old orchards are being
removed, and new ones planted.
The number of vOlcan Oes discovered
constantly increases with the progress
OF geographical knowledee-highly vol
canic regions b ing found in the least
explored countries. A. Won Humboldt
enumerated 407, OF which 227 were ac-
tive. Several thousand are now known,
and, according to M. Fuchs, the number
OF active volcanoes known at the pres
ent time may be set down as 323. 1t Is
difficult to draw the line between active
and extinct volcanoes, for the reason
that the greater portion of the former
have periods of repose, sometimes a
century or more in length. The ancients
considered Vesuvius harmless noun
tain UP to the time of the great eruption
of A. d. 70, when Herculaneum and
Pompeii were buried; and it was quiet
from 1906 to l63l-more than three cen
turies.
The New York Graphic says that
hot for use. Beds and mattresses piled
on each other accumulate heat, hold
fixed air, and make the sleeping chamber
close and "stuffy." There is alto
gether too much lumber about many of
our bedsteads. They fill up the room,
perhaps At best too limited in space, and
prevent the free circulation of air. A
bed in summer needs plenty of air un-
der rs well as over it. This air should
not remain fixed or siagnant. The best
summer bed is light cot with ham,
mock bottom. which in the morning
may be folded up and removed from the
space occupied ut night. The old and
sometimes renewed style OF cumbrous
bedsteads with heavy mahogany frames
and carved headboards is one of the un-
healthful and absurd relics of antiqui y.
The facts, so far as they are obtain
able, go to show that New Workers pay
out more money for flowers than the
people of any other city. On New
Years day, 1914, the sales of the largest
shop then in New York only amounted
TO 5000. and the sales of all the shops
then in the city only amounted to about
| 81, 600. 1t is now said that the sales of
howers on that day in New York amount
TO not less than $780, The salee
throughout the year extend far into the
millions. Within radius of twelvs
miles from the center of the city it is
estimated that there are fully 500 floral
establishments, and that the capital in
vested in land. buildings and stock is
not less than $S 600, 900 or $l0,000000.
The greenhouses in which the flowers
sold are cultivated are on the upper part
of Manhattan Island. in Hudson county,