Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1883-11-14
TOPICS OF THE DAY.

lures was $970O0,00O in 1866; It was
only $4,000, 900 in 1874; in 1851 It was
over $lOOO0O,000; in 1882, over $l45,.
100000, and 1883 it was Sl33,O00,O0O.
This gives aper capita wealth of 50. GO.
A French inventor, who has pat
ented a machine for the use of con-
centrated solar rays as n general mo-
tive power, has set up three of his
machines in Algeria for the French
government. He is now carrying on
experiments at the island of Porque-
ROLES, near Hyeres, in France, where
he is threshing Indian corn and rails
ing water by the action of the suns
rays.
Indiana has a Jay Gould in the per-
son Of E. II. Shirk of Peru, who owns
seventy-three farms in Indiana that
are all in high state of cultivation.
He also owns thousands of acres in
Texas, Arkansas, Michigan and Iowa,
nine residences, business blocks with
out number, some of them being stu
ated in Chicago and Indianapolis, three
banks, several stores, and as many
mills, which he conducts himself.
1t is cOnjectured that the "bad lands"
of Dakota may owe their condition to
a process which may now be seen 60
ing on in the region between Bismarck
and the Little Missouri river. Over a
tract some two hundred feet square
the air quivers with the heat, sulphu-
rous vapors make crystalline deposit
on the edges Of creyices in the soil,
and a reddish glow is given out This
results from the combustion of coal
beneath the surface. and it was going
on when the region was first visited
by white men,
An Illinois woman named Margaret
Robbins, wife of a well-to-do farmer,
got mad at her husband ten years ago
because he lost some money she brought
him, went to bed, saying she would
never get up or do stroke of work,
and has been there ever since. She
felt tired three years ago, started to
60 to the breakfast table, fell and
broke her ankle, and has not left the
sheets since. She is as cross as a bear,
scolds everything an inch high, keeps
a broom handle to pound the patient
daughter who waits on her, and knows
every bit of gossip and scandal going
within thirty miles.
An organ which has just been built
in Germany is believed to bethe largest
in existence. 1t counts one hundred
and seventy-four registers, and is
worked automatically by gasmotor Of
four-horse power. Its height is twenty
metres, its width eleven, and its depth
ten. Its largest wooden pipe is ten
metres long, and of a cubical capacity
of two thousand litres. The instru-
ment is to be set up in the cathedral at
Riga, For the st. Stephens cathedral
of Vienna the same builders are soon to
still larger organ. The we'll
known organs Of Boston, Ulm and st.
Petersburg were built by the same
men.
a railroad superintendent has given
the San Francisco cal an estimate of
the cost Of an average train on q first
class railroad For an express train
locomotive, $4,000; baggage car,
$1,000; smoking car, $4,000; dining
room car, $l2, 900 five first class Pull,
mans, $4,000 each total. $4,000.
The ordinary express train represents
about $S5,000 Some Pullman cars
cost $4,000 each. The average value
of freight train is still greater than
that of passenger train if the rolling
stock and value of property are in
Guided Sometimes the through freight
trains aggregate in value from $3.50,
OOO to 100000
The bird population of Wisconsin is
estimated at siXty-six per square mile.
or 1866, 900 for the State. Each bird
is assumed to eat fifty insects a day, or
5000 for the summer. Hence, all the
birds will consume 2l,3S4,000,0O0 in
sects year. Add to this amount the
work which these birds do in their
homes, and we have Il low
estimate of the influences they exert
over insect life, Multiply these figures
by forty-eight, for the States and Ter
and we arrive at the con-
clusion not only that our bird popu-
lation is pretty large, but also, that,
it, our bug population would
soon be so large that it would eat us
up.
The man Of the nineteenth century
seems bent on annihiating time. At
the Louisville Exposition. the governor
of Arkansas wore a suit Of clothes
made from cotton which had been
cleaned, ginned, carded, spun, dyed,
worn, cut and stitched by the tailor,
all in one afternoon. Forty.four hours
1 - = 4.