Connecticut western news., 1885-03-04
NOTES AND COMMENTS.

AN idea of how quickly gossip flies may be gained from little incident that occurred in Birmingham, Ala, recently, where rumor "got out" that one of the female school teachers was to be married, and in few hours no less than fifty applications for her place were made.
 A MASSACHUSETTS paper prints 1t as follows: If man spends cents day, six days a week for 52 weeks, for tobacco, drinks 237s quarts of poor beer, goes to the New England fair on horse-trot day, and refuses to subscribe to his home paper, how big a mortgage has he got on his farm
 A WRITER in the Atlantic, speaking of the maliciousness of the mocking bird, states that if young birds are placed in cages where the parent birds can have access to them, they will feed their off- spring regularly for two or three days, and then, as if in despair, will poison them, giving them the berry of the black ash.
 A CUsToM HOUSE Inspector, while roaming over a steamer at New York on Monday, observed a peculiar hump on the back of one of the sailors. He made a diagnosis of the hump, and found that it was formed by forty dozen pairs of spectacles, worth about S1.50 a pair. The duty on imported spectacles is 35 per cent. The goods were seized.
 A NORTHERN contractor grading a rail road in the South had considerable trouble with bis negro laborers and con- plained to a friend of their slowness.
 Discharge the leader of the gang, " said the latter, "and get man who can sing lively songs." It was done and the de- sign had the desired effect, the negroes picks and shovels moving obediently to
 the melody.
 IN Buncombe county, N. C., the house
 of a colored woman named Alice Wilson
 caught on fire and her three small chil.
 dren were burned to death before they
 could be rescued. It is said that over
 one hundred colored children have been
 burned to death in this manner in North
 Carolina since October last Mothers of little children lock them in their houses and go away.
 TEE exploring expedition which sets
 out from San Francisco for Alaska as
 soon as spring opens will be composed
 entirely of officers and enlisted men of the navy. Asuitable stern-wheel launch is to be built, under contract, for the use of the expedition. Many of the articles , of outfit, especially canned goods, will be taken from the supplies turned ir } from the Greedy relief expedition. , TIE officers of the torpedo station a , Newport, R. l., experimented with some , torpedoes on the ice. The water ant ice arose in a vertical column some 20C | feet. The holes blown in the ice cleal l about thirty-fve or forty feet across, ana
 it was shattered for some distance be 3 yond that. These torpedoes were said I to be charged with about thirty-foul ? pounds of gun cotton each, which is es 3 timated to possess a force equal to 200 ? pounds of gunpowder.
 2 IN a suburb of Boston an amateur a dramatic society was recently rehearsinG - play under the supervision of Bostor t actor, who, in the course of the re !? hearsal, severely reprimanded one of tht k. young ladies for inattention; whereupoI a the injured young woman burst int @ tears and told him he was no gentleman f to address lady so. "Shut up," sai, l, the irate manager, "you're not lad. l now, you're an actress" and the pla.
 went on uninterrupted to the end of tn
 rehearsal.
 THE robbery of the slaughter hous . reminds us of an attempt made som
 months ago by burglars to cut an en
 trance into its safe. While the burglar
 were thus occupied, wild Attakapa J bull broke out of pen and furiousl J rushed in the direction of the predator : rascals, frightening them away. Had U not been for the interruption caused b U the bull the robbers would have sue $ ceeded in securing the nice little sum c
 S32, ,OO0 then deposited in the safe.- U Ne,U Orleans States.
 0 A GENTLEMAN of veracity told me ths ,, for three nights he dreamed that a ma Il with full red face appeared to him 'i carrying hammer, which he held owe e his head in menacing manner. On tn y morning after the last dream the gentle y man went to his place of business c e usual; on his way he passed shop. Th D door was open, and there stood, wit 'e hammer uplifted, the man seen in th
 dream. The two men stopped and locke a at each other and said nothing. Aquee T. coincidence. Macon (Ga.) Telegraph