The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1890-07-23
CURIOUS FACTS.

Punctuation marks are less than 4UU
years old.
One million dollars, gold coin. weigh
365.S pounds.
Triplcts born in Newman, Ga, have
been named Red, White and Blue.
Measure 200 feet on each SIDE and you
will have square acre within an inch.
A cabman in Philadelphia found $780,
900 in his cab and returned it all to the
| owner.
ONLY one book out of 100000 in the
Boston public library fails to be re-
turned.
The first knives were used in England,
and the first wheeled carriage in France
in 1859.
Criminals are executed by the sword or
guillotine in Switzerland. The mode
differs in various Cantons.
| The lark does not rise until after the
chafinch, linnet and number of other
hcdgerow folk have been merrily piping
for good while.
Alaska was purchased from Russia in
1867, for S7,500, 900, and the United
States government has already received
that sum from the seal fisheries.
The District of Columbia, located on
both sides of the Potomac, was ceded to
the United States by Maryland and Vir-
ginia, and accepted in 1890 as the seat OF
government.
The twentieth anniversary of a we'd
ding is never celebrated. tits considered
very unlucky to do so. The Scotch
think one or the other will die within
the wear if the twentieth anniversary is
even alluded to.
The Valley of the Amazon is larger
tban,that of the Mississippi, the former
river draining E $50 ago 900 square miles;
the Mississippi 1,244, 900 square miles:
The Amazon drains a greater area than
any river on the globe.
The greatest length of the United
States from the Atlantic to the Pacific,
on the parallel of forty-two degrees, is
276s miles; and its greatest breadth,
from Point Isabel, Texas, to the northern
boundary near Pembina, North Dakota,
1911 miles.
The Anglo-saxon Godric, Sheriff of
Buckingham, England, according to the
old chronicles of the reign of William
the Conqueror, ''granted to Aleuid half
n hide of land as long as he should be
Sheriff, on condition she taught his
daughter the art of embroidery"
The library of Cornell University pos
sesses an oriental manuscript writt.n on
palm leaves, consisting of 1875 strips or
leaves, each seven by one and o quarter
inches, fastened together by cord pass
ing through hole in the center OF each
leaf. The writing is done on each side
of the leaves by etching the characters
with sharp instrument on the palm
leaves, which have been afterward rubbed
over with a black pigment.
The Watsonville (Cal.) Transcript
saws: An ancient coin was picked up
from the bed of the Pajaro River by Anna
Peckham this week. On one side is the
head of q warrior and on the other four
war horses attached to a chariot driven
by a soldier. Records prove it to be
coin cast in the time of Herod Agrippa
H.. with the head of Nero. 1t is in
good state of preservation, with the ex-
ception of the supcrscription, which IS
incomplete.
At average speed man walks three
miles IN hour, or four feet per second;
horse trots seven miles per hour, or ten
feet per second; q steamboat moves
eighteen miles per hour, twenty-six feet
per second; moderate wind blows seven
miles per hour, ten feet per second; O
storm moves thirty-six miles per hour,
fifty-two feet per second; sound travels
743 miles per hour, 1142 feet per
second; light moves 1872, 600 miles per
second, and electricity 2ss, 900 miles per
second.
A marvellous lace wonder is reported
as landed in the United States. 1t is q
unique specimen of embroidery and Irish
lace, specially manufactured for the great
international exhibition of 1851, atwhich
it took first prize. It took twelve girls
twelve months to make this perfect speci-
men of the old hand embroidery and lace
of Ireland. The cost was $4,000. No
work of to-day is so fine and exquisite as
the drawn and embroidered border of
ths wonder. The main design is a chap
let of fern leaves, entwined with the
rose, the shamrock and the thistle.