Connecticut western news., 1889-09-18
QUEER INVENTIONS.
HUNDREDS OF ODD AND FUNNY
 DEVICES.

The Nickel in the Slot and It's
 Many Uses.
 In conversation had recently with Commissioner Mitchell of the Patent Office, he alluded to the flood of pat ents for the slot machines ill which you drop coin and get something. "Yes," said he sthe slot division is being pushed, night and day. It be- gins to look as if the drummer and the saleslady would equally be super ceded by this speeches. monster, and every mortal want would come to be. supplied through the slot. Why, just look here." And he produced draw ings and specifications of numerous machines, standing about as high as a man, and of incredible fecundity. "Here's the first" he went on. "Drop nickel in the slot and it will weigh you and push you out little card with your avoirdupois stamped neatly upon it. Here's another that will tell your age for a nickel without the slight est assistance. Here's one that sells ice water-a glass for one cent and makes change for you from a coin of any sort. It has made its appearance on the streets of Chicago and Minneap- olis, and the mayor has ordered the police to protect it. It is temperance ally, and it is anticipated that it will shortly stand near all the crowded cor ners of every great city. Here's one that dispenses soda water all by itself-punch in your nickel and you get your soda. Here's another that proffers any one of four teen sorts of liquors, including Yam kee cocktail. And here's the best of them all-look at the elaborate clock work in the interior. See the kero- sene lamp on one side and the ice chamber on the other, and the asbestos between" This is supposed to stand solus and majestic on corner of the street, its fires always burning like those of the Aztec altars of sacrifice, its ice always freezing like that of the Icelandic hades, silently offering its treasures to the passer-by. Of any one of sixteen things it gives him five cents worth. The fluids come out of the faucets; the solids are showed down the little inclined planes on either side. Only one thing is want ing-a city directory; and that will doubtless come later. After the slot has engulfed the stipulated coin, it immediately responds with the re- quired refreshment on the hand being turned to the mark and allowed to re- main over it.
 looked into the bowels of this un- speakable salesman. Its interior is wonderfully elaborate; wheels and cogs and elbows and levers and shafts and eccentric movements conspiring to the desired end. I turned away with sense of dizziness. There have been three hundred patents granted for the slot machines and two hundred are pending. The very latest is the application of the device to toilet rooms-one cent being dropped ill the slot. The cannon plough is a presum- ably convenient implement for sub- soiling and warfare on the frontier, for, as the ploughbeam is hollow and loaded, it can instantly be wheeled and fired, killing the Indians and horses whichever happens to be in the way. But the same inspired genius has patent ed the pistol pocketbook-when the in nocent and unsuspecting burglar asks you for your pocketbook you careless ly take it out and empty its contents into his abdomen.
 There is claim in the patent office for patent on the Lords prayer, the specification being that the repetition of the same, rapid and in loud tone of voice, will cure stammering Among odd inventions are chicken hopples, which walk the chicken right out of the garden when she tries to scratch; the bee-moth eXcluder, which automatically shuts up all the beehives when the hens go to roost; the tape worm fish-hook which speaks for it. self; the educational balloon with g map of the world outlined on it's sur. face; side-hill annihilators-stilts to fit on the down-hill legs of horse when he is ploughlng along side-hill and the hen-surpriser, device tha1 drops the new-laid egg through the bottom of the nest, with intent to be- guile and wheedle the hen into at once laying another.
 One of the latest patents is an auto matic bath-tub, which starts the ho and cold water at given moment il the morning to which it has been set maintains exactly the right tempera ture of it by graduating the flow o1 the water, rings bell when all ii ready, and two minutes later suddenly drops the sleeper's pillow about a foo and turns him out.
 The illuminated cat was devised by a genius. She is built of pasteboar( and made luminous with phosphorus