The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1889-08-15

anu new Testament eight times over in
the space ofone inch square.
When this wonderful microscopic
writing was enlarged by photography
every letter and point were perfect and
could be plainly seen.
In museum of curiosities at Salem.
Mass, there is preserved a common
cherry seed or stone, followed and
fashioned like basket. Within the
basket are twelve tiny silver spoons,
the shape and finish of which can not
be distinguished with the naked eye.
The name of the artist who constructed
this little wonder has been lost, but the
existence of the thing itself will not be
questioned by any one from the old
witch headquarters of the Bay State,
DIR. Peter Oliver, who was born in
England somewhere about the begin
ming OF the eighteenth century, tells US
OF seeing carved cherry stone that
would be wonder even in this era of
fine tools and fine workmanship. The
stone was from a common cherry, upon
which were carved the heads of 1874
popes, kings, saints, queens and empe-
rors, and, small as they must necessa-
rily have been, it is announced, on the
authority OF Mr.. Oliver, that the heads
of the popes and kings could readily be
distinguished from those of the queens
and saints by their mitres and crowns.
The gentleman who brought this little
wonder to England purchased it in
Prussia, allowing the original owner
$4,000 for his treasure.
Mark Scarlost, blacksmith who
lived under the reign of Queen Eliza
beth, made chain of forty-tive links, to
which he attached a paddock made of
steel and brass, consisting of fifteen
pieces besides the key. The chain was
so small as to freely admit of being
fastened about the neck of common
every day flea, and the apparatus, flea,
chain, paddock, key and all weighed
but grain and half when exhibited
before the wondering royalty on a plate
of polished silver.
The reader, will, no doubt, think
these flea and cherry-stone stories
worthy to be taken with the proverbial
grain of salt. noting, as he will, that
they nearly all bear the date and stamp
''ye olden times;" but what will he say
when informed that within the last
five years San Francisco professor
has equaled Mark Scarlost's ingenuity
in, every particular.
This Golden Gate grasper after the
infinitesimal exhibited a perfectly
trained team of feas, drawing a minia-
ture tally-ho coach made of gold, with
all four wheels perfect, each turning
on its axle. All the elite of San Fran
cisco witnessed the professors wonder
full exhibition of his control over these
risky little pests, and all were unspar-
ing in their praise of the queer little
team, the professor and the golden
coach.
The first watch was made in Nurem-
berg in the cherry-stone about the
year 1477. Soon after its invention
curious gold and silversmiths began
to experiment in what they could do in
the way of diminutive time-pieces.
One of these, now over 200 years old,
is kept as wonder in one of the Swiss
museums. 1t is only 3-16 of an inch in
diameter, but small as it is, it not only
indicates hours and minutes, but
seconds, days of the week. days of the
month and the number of the year.
Another of the old Nuremberg won
ders was in the form of An acorn, five
sixteenths of an inch in diameter and
half an inch long. 1t was perfect in
every particular, kept good time and
was used as a charm on a lady's neck
lace.
One of exactly the same pattern, but
provided with tiny pistol, which was
used as an alarm, is now to be seen in
the South Kensington Museum, Lon
don. King George III. of England had
a watch not larger than an oId-fash-
ioned silver fve-ceut piece, which had
120 different parts, the whole not
weighing as much as silver dime. 1t
would take column of the Item to
enumerate all the dainty little time
pieces that have been invented during
the past 400 years, They have been
made no larger than peas, and set in
rings for physicians to facilitate the
counting of the pulse. They have also
been fixed in bracelets, brooches, eye
glasses, tops of pencils and even in
hands. Finished workman
ship and plenty of money will provide
almost any thing that can be conjured
up by myriad-minded people.
The enginemakers, like the watch
makers, have also tried to attain dis
tinction in the matter of the diminu-
tive. In 1870, John Penn. the eminent
maker of great steam engines, who re-
sided at Greenwich, England, came in
possession of what was then the small
est steam engine in the world. 1t stood
on a three-penny piece. 1t really
covered less space, for its base-plate
only three-eighths of an inch
by about three-tenths. From the ex-
treme smallness of the model some of