Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1881-11-10
FACTS FOR THE CURIOUS.

parent.
The cavity containing the brain of the
rhinoceros is only about half as large as
human skull.
On wing of butterfly have been
found 100, 600 scales, and on that of @
silkworm moth 100000.
WITH piece of wood in their hands.
or with their fists only, orang outangs are
able to drive off even elephants.
In lecture delivered before the ROYAL
Institution of Great Britain, Prof. Ball
said that if the IDEAS of biologists in re-
gard to the age of the earth were cor.
rect, and that if $4,000, 900 years was
comparable with geologic time. then " in
no probability none of the stars now
visible to the unaided eye can then have
been visible from the earth.
The Japanese have discovered that a
few seconds previous to an earthquake
the magnet temporarily loses its power.
They place a cup of bell metal under a
suspended horseshoe magnet which has
weight attached to its armature. On
the magnet becoming paralyzed the
weight drops upon the cup and gives
the alarm, and out rush the families to
the open air for safety.
PROF. HUTCHINSON has, in one of his
lectures, mentioned very interesting
fact ascertained in Berlin. Among Ro-
man Catholics, who prohibit marriages
between persons who are near blood
relatives, the proportion of deaf mutes
Is In 5000; among Protestants. who
view such marriages as permissible, the
proportion is l in 1000; while among
Jews, who encourage intermarriage with
blood relations, the deaf mutes are as
In 400.
EaGs, says M. Arsonval, during the
first days of incubation absorb much
heat. This process is accompanied by
an absorption of oxygen and an album
dant liberation of carbonic acid. During
sleep animals absorb much oxygen and
evolve little heat, the emission of car
bonic acid varying very little. Animals
are not merely the seatof oxidations and
conclusions. Every living being is, at
the same time, reducing apparatus
which effects synthesis.
IT was the discovery of sheet-iron
rolling in 1928 which gave the great i'm
petus to the tin-plate trade in England.
The manufacture of timed sheet-iron
had been introduced there from the con-
tinent in as early as 1910, but it had not
become established until about half a
century later, and for many years the
English continued to import plates from
Hamburg, to which they now send
thousands of boxes annually. The con-
tinental and early English tin-plates
were hammered, not rolled.
A MISSIONARY residing In Northern In
dia tells of class called "Chumus"
Comprising tanners aud shoemakersl
who have legal right to the bodies Of
all cattle that die, and who eat the meat
of such cattle, whatever the disease that
causes death. A physician, who resid-
ed among the Hindoos twenty years.
says that those people remain as healthy
as the other Hlndoos who are vegetari-
ans, though at times they eat enormous
ly of the flesh Of cattle that have died of
epidemic and virulent diseases.
A CHARGE of three Kilograms of dy-
Mantle piaces on plate of iron
five centimeters thick and one meter
square makes a hole seven centimeters
in diameter. A hole fifteen centimeters
deep and two centimeters across was
made i'll an anvil weighing 200 kilo-
grams. A wall $50 meters high and
half meter thick was blown down bv
three and half kilograms in zinc cart
ridges. A boat laden with hydraulic ce-
ment sank in the Rhine, near Cologne,
and impeded navigation. One hundred
and thirty Kilograms of stonebreaker"
were simply placed on it and exploded
by battery on shore. The boat and its
cargo were reduced to fragments, which
the current carried away.
The Decentralization of Riches.
Said an aged politician and editor to
me, 81 like to read your off-hand social
sermons, because they seem to be con-
LESSONS. Now let me make a confession
to you | don't believe, although /
have large summer house at the most
successful resort in the country, that
the designations and broken habits of
the long season do me any good or give
NE any rest, or that | am as well in
sured for length of days in the idle sum-
mer as in the severe winter. And can
you tell me, thou Diogenes of Broad
way why everybody is visiting the
summer resorts and at such an increase
of board bills and family expenses ?"
sit is the rise OF wealth, said l, "re-
sulting from the development and specu-
lation i'll a new country, giving an unrest
to young and old, and making the most
forward our leaders whether in physics
or morals. None dare be independent
where all can be rich. When George
the Fourth was ruling a successful en-
pire that had just finished thirty years
OF war and was trading with the whole
world, b au Brummel, who could starch
his collars and neckties the incest, was
the next man to the King, though a
sharper and q parasite, and the King,
without a single virtue, was called the
, first gentleman of Europe r"
ALIAS " said the political sage,
"there is too much wealth, / fear, to
make us as happy as we have been. ]
am sure people are not as happy as in
the day of small incomes ana quiet hab-
its. / know most Cf our rich men, and
as men they are not the social equals of
the moderately rich men of forty years
ago. Rufus King was then my neighbor
at Albany, considered the richest man
north of New York, and the leading
banker. He told me that it cost him
only 81, 900 year for his whole expens-
rs and family, and no other man lived as
well in Albany. Yet his expenses would
not now pay his children's school bills.
When l was Collector of the Port of Al
bany, at salary of 81 day, / felt as if
had got lift that would make me in.
dependent, and when l saved $3.50 a
year | felt that was on the high road
to success. No man in those days had
81, 900, 900, OF, if he had, he was consid-
cred to have vast responsibilities to his
country and his God Now 81 900, 900
excites no admiration, and l do not
think it brings much compensation. 1t
only goads the man to push out for
more. His relations to his faculties
and his health are worse. His career is
really more contracted, because he is
sitting down by the million like pin by
loadstone, unable to get away from
its influence upon his mentality" y
cath. in NelO York Tribune.
Tall Stories of Old Age.
From Brazil comes story of mulat
to woman having died at the age of Is,
years. Just as the Goth was clutch
| cred to make Roman holiday" so this
| unfortunate old colored LADY, seems I,
| have been killed II furnish forth n news