The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1883-11-02
GLEANINGs.

Weedy pastures make poor and bitter
butter.
Austria has more than seventy agri-
cultural schools.
OF the bishops of the Church of Eng
land three are over eighty and nine
over seventy years Of age.
A Boston reporter embellishes his base
ball column with quotations from the
Greek and Latin poets.
Charles Parrish, the coal king of the
Wyoming region OF Pennsylvania, has
retired from business after twenty years
hard labor.
The demand for alligator skins for
ladies' reticules and Things, required
the slaughter of 500, 900 aliigstors last
year. The reptiles are growing scarce.
Ex-Governor Stanford. of California.
owns one ranch al VIVA. Tehama cOun-
ty. covering 2j,0O0 acres Of land. It
will be planted in grapes.
Rolling u barrel over onions inclined
TO run to tops will partially check
their growth, and leave the bulbs to
get the full benefit of the fertility of tine
| soil.
The Palestine Exploration fund has
Indirectly recovered from Il Bedouin
tribe, east of the Jordan. pieces Of skin
containing portions OF Deuteronomy and
the Commandments, made about $40
years before Christ.
Professor Tyndall has made observa-
tons in Switzerland that show that the
silent flashes called ''heat lightning
are not, rs generally supposed. harm
less, but Indicate thunder-stOrms which
may not be twenty miles away.
A California millionaire is preparing
TO erect a Chinese theatre on a grand
scale for the entertainment of visitors,
who will nave boxes, where the atien-
ton may be equally divided between
the stage and the Chinese portion of the
audience.
Miss Louisa de Ia Rance, ..Ouida,"
writes to the London Times in favor of
making a copyright treaty with the
United States with the concurrence of
publishers. She opposes any admission
into England of American reprints of
English works rs ruinous to authors
and to literature.
As early rs the time of Alexander II,
of Scotland, q man who let weeds 90 to
seed on a farm was declared TO be the
Kings enemy. In Denmark farmers
are compelled to destroy all weeds on
their premises. In France q man can
prosecute his neighbor for damages
who permit weeds to go to seed which
may endanger ne%ighboring lands.
InOmaS'A. Edison, the electrician,
said the other day: 81 have given up
inventing and experimenting. l am Il
business man now. devoted to making
inventions pay. 1t requires just al
much ingenuity to make money out of
an invention rs to make the invention.
! am a contractor, and like the work.
! have sold out my interest in the cleo
tric locomotive, and 10 TOT want to see
the inside of a laboratory"
A Bordeaux merchant owns a mon. |
ster mastiff called Lion. Walking with
him on the quay. there came a little
mad dog along, followed by an excited
crowd. Lion seized it BY the neck.
It'.ped into the water. and held it under
water until drowned. This was excel |
lent. and Lion received an ovation; but
as Lion subsequently developed a ten
dency TO do the same by all small dogs,
mad or sane. he has perforce been muz.
zled.
Hon. Rufus Prince. president of the
Maine State Agricultural Society, writes
The Maine Farmer; ~ am no horse
tOctOr. but | will give you a very SIM
pie but effective cure for scratches
given me by one that had the care of
horses for a long time. and which has
never failed with me. 1t is this: Wind
\ WOODEN rag around the horses ankle
and fasten it on and let it be unit. IL
wears oil. No matter ii you drive your
horse in the mud. do not take off the
and before You think of it the scratch
IS will be cured"
European statistiaians are gradually
reducing their estimates of the popula-
lion Of China. 1t used to be put at Over
400, 600. 900. Benin and Wagner reduce
heir estimate for China and COrea from
l34. 500. 600 to 379. SOC. 600. Peterson re-
!luces his estimate by $4,000. 900, max
ing the present total 800, 600, O00. DIR.
Happier, missionary, believes this can
safely be reduced another 80. 000. 900.
Mr.. Hippisly. Acting Commissioner of
Customs, thinks 2J0, 600, 900 more near
~ correct than $50. 600, 900. The losses
by the Tapping and MOhammeaan re-
belli0ns. and by the famine and pesti-
lence which swept the provinces of Chi
Ii, Shantung, Shansi. ShepSi aud HOuan
are %variOusly estimated ut from 81 ,O00,-
900 to 81. 600. 00O.
There is something beyond c~alcula-
ton in the speed of steamboats,. Two
boats NAV he built simultaneously from
the same model. with every effort to
make them precise duplicates as TO
shape and machinery, and yet n will
prove faster than the other. Why this
is no man can tell. The Mary Powell
has for fifteen wears been the swiftest
boat on the Hudson river. During all
that time she never has been beaten.
Time and again an exact counterpart
has been built. with everything copied
rs nearly as the best mechanics and IA
could do it, but none of these
has turned out as good as the original.
has been the same with
yachtsmen. They order copies of the
swiftest craft or combine the supposed
good points of several, and nine times
out Of ten are disappointed IN the re-
suit.
Among other things brought to this
by President Soto, OF Hondu-
ras, is a silver cup made before the APP
pearance OF the S~paniards in Central
America. There is an opal in a rough
state, five inches high. valued at 81, 900.
and other stones of the same species,
smaller. and cut in various forms. One
of the cases is filled with coffee, none Of
it is said, finds it way to the
United States. the French and English
purchasing it at 25 cents per pound. In
one case is an exhibit of fibre obtained
from a species of pineapple, which, as
it is tough, fine, and takes dyes with
success, is used as filling in silks. 1t
has been woven into cloth. which has
every appearance of silk, and has been
manufactured into delicate lace. Sew
eral samples of the grass from which
Panama hats are made are exhibited,
also are ipecac leaves and roots, ia
lap, ginger roots, allspice berries and
other spices.
1t is an old and true saying that a
falsehoOd grows as it travels. A west
ern young man who shared with his
a love of card playing wOn 500
of the old gentleman one night and left
next morning for New York. He had
not been there many days before he
was astOunded by seeing his own name
in the city papers and learning that he
had ~savagely attacked his father with a
inilicting probably fatal injuries,
knocked his mother senseless. and fed
from justice. 1t happened thus: The
morning he left home \ neighbor had
-x.-rat $b, Rcnt chat 10 k.l k,S1