Arizona weekly enterprise., 1882-08-12
BITS OF INFORMATION.

BENJAMIN WEST was President of the Royal Academy, London, in 1792.
 PLATO was born 429 B. O., and died h;nong friends at wedding feast, at the L.ge of 81.
 THE Rothschild family and house was founded by Anseln at Frankfort, in 1743 to TYP.
 THE words "Comin' thro' the rye" do not refer to field of rye, but to a GUS tom at fording place of the river Rye, where. if yonng man and woman met he was entltle,l to n kiss.
 THE origin. of the phrase "dark as Egypts night" is found in the tenth chapter of Exodus, the 2lst to 23d verses: And the Lord said unto Moses, stretch out thine hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, even darkness that may be felt. l And Moses stretched forth lis hand toward heaven; and there was a thick | darkness in all the land of Egypt for l three days they saw not ono another, neither rose any frcm his place for three days; but all the children of Israel had hght in their dwellings,.
 | LIE lultINSb III IllS uisEDTN OI NGW Testament manuscripts, which has been accustomed by the late revision, brings to notice the somewhat curious derivation of the word "traitog." On the 22d Of l February, A. D. 303, the Roman Enpe- TOT Diocletian i>sued decree requiring all Christians to deliver up their sacred writings to be burnel, on penalty of torture and death. The decree went in to effect simultaneously in the various provinces of the empire, and churches were broken into in the search for cop ies of the sacred writings, and when the books could not be found those who were supposed to be their custodians were tortured til they told their secret or died. Private individuals were exam ined with memorable rigor, and bribes and tortures were freely applied. Some yielded and delivered up their precious manuscripts to be burned. They were not many who did so, but for those who did snew word of infamy came into use. They were called deliverers up, ''traditores in the Latin, aud from this came our English " traitors"
 THE story of the origin of the phrase "the dark horse, which is now SC com monly used in Q political sense, is as follows: Once upon time there lived ill Tennessee an old chap named Sam Flynn, who traded in horses, and gen. erally contrived to own speedy nag or two, which he used for racing purposes whenever he could pick up "soft match " during his travels. The best of his flyers WAS coal-black stallion named Dusly Pete, who was almost a thoroughbred and able to go in the best of company. Flynn was accustomed to straddie Pete when approaching town and ride him into 1t to give the i'm. pression that the animal was merely 8 "likely hoss" and not 6 fast stopper. One day he came to town where c country race meeting was being held and he entered Pete among the contest ants. The people of the town, not knowing anything of his antecedents and not being over impressed by his ap pearance, backed two or three local far vorites heavily against him. Flynn moved among the crowd and took al the bets offered against his nag. Jus as the "hyers" were being saddled fol the race old Judge McMinamee, whC was the turf oracle of that part of tho State, arrived on the course and wa. made one of the judges. As he took hi place on the stand he was told how tn, betting ran, and of the folly of the owne of the strange entry in backing hi "plug" so heavily. Running his ey, over the track the judge instantly rec ognized Pete, and said, "Gentlemen there's 8 dark horse in this race that vii make some of you sick before supper. The judge was right. Pete, the "dsrl horse" lay back until the three-quarte pole was reached, when he went to tn front with rush, and won the purs and Flynn's bets with the greatest ease