Morning journal and courier., 1884-01-24

@N~e As W 70 AO9 0oOdAbC tAAS OA4AAASA AoA OooA1 expedited but because there had been fraud
 and forgery in the money transactions in
 which they were the ware disposed of. In
 another case father so mall
 treated an adopted child that it died within twenty,four hours after he had
 been paid 45O krones expressly to 'expedite'
 it. How many such cases are there in Oopen-
 hagen that are never discovered or punish
 ed?" The population of Copenhagen is about
 250. 900; in 1882 the total number of chil-
 dren born in the city was e,634, and those
 born out of wedIock thus constituted more
 than one-fifth of the whole. It is proposed
 to establish not only an infant asylum, but
 society as well for the support and mainte-
 nance of a properly guaranteed system of
 outside nursing of the waifs.
 In 8 recent letter MT. Edward Atkinson
 points out some things which may happen
 to this great and glorious country, if some- ting is not done to improve our ridiculous system of coinage. The wheat crop of India is constantly increasing, being at present five times as large 1t was 8 few years ago. If it continues, and there is no reason why it should not, England will obtain from that source the bulk of it's surplus wheat. The excess of our exports over our imports during 1883 was $1O0,658, ,4s8, while the
 value of our exports of bread and bread stutfs alone was $20s, o40, $50. Other exports and imports remaining as before, if the foreign demand for our wheat should decline fifty per cent, it would wipe out the entire excess and leave balance against us. If the foreign demand should cease entirely, the balance against us would be as great as the present excess in our favor, and coin would have to be shipped abroad to make up the difference. England, France and Germany would have no use for our 95-cent silver dol lar, unless to take it at it's bullion value. But as gold is the money of commerce, the silver dollar would not be in demand, our supply of gold would speedily be depleted, and the value of silver, which we are hoarding in such quantities and which we would desire to get rid of, would decline. The result would be to make silver the legal tender of the country and to make gold merchandise. The clipped silver dollar would become the legal money of the country, and labor would be paid in currency which had lost 10 or 15 per cent. of its purchasing power, while the prices of the necessities of life. regulated by the gold stan- dard of the gold-dealing nations. would be 10 or 15 per cent. higher than if paid in gold
 Those who have read Sir John Lubbock's exceedingly interesting account of his deal ings with ants know something of his inge- nuity. He has recently applied himself to teaching dogs to make their wants known and the results he has attained are surprising and significant. It occurred to him, he says, whether some such system as that followed with deaf mutes, especially by Dr. Howes with Laura Bridgman, might not prove very instructive if adapted to the case of dogs. He used his own dog, a black poodle. to ex- pertinent with. He printed in legible letters on pieces of stout cardboard such words as "food," s'bone," siout" He got the head master of deaf and dumb school to assist at the experiments. They began by giving ths dog food in 8 saucer, over which was laid the card on which was the word "food, and beside which was placed an empty saucer covered by plain card. s'Van, the poodle soon learned to distinguish between the two Afterward ho was taught to bring the card which expressed his wants. ''This he now does, '' says Sir John Lubbock, 'sand hands 1t to me quite prettily, and then give him bone or a little food, or take him out, &C., cording to the card brought. He still brings sometimes 8 plain card, in which case point out his error, and he then takes it back and changes it." That mistake however is not often made by Van. He has learned to distinguish between the card with the word and the blank card, no matter how often their relative positions are changed. Sir John intends to keep up his experiments in this line and hopes that some positive results may follow, which will en- able us to obtain 8 more correct insight into the minds of animals than we have yet ac- quired. By and by perhaps we shall be able to converse freely with our dogs and horses