The Opelousas courier., 1890-10-11
SELECT sIFTINGS.

A Bowery museum advertises the
"biggest dwarf in the world.
To salute with the left hand is o deadly
insult to Mohammedans in the East.
Until 1776 cotton spinning was per
formed by the hand spinping-wheei.
Lewis Ledger, Of New York city, on
a wager recently ate thirty hard-boiled
eggs in fifteen minutes.
The proportion of married couples who
live to celebate their golden wedding is
under one in a thousand.
The old Craddock fort on Ship street,
East Medford, Mass, is the Oldest house
in America. 1t was begun in 1884.
A New York broker has just paid $751;
600 for a half interest in a.salmon stream
that flows into the Restigouche, in Canada.
The presence of a well developed
apple growing on the grapevine at Ports
mouth, Ohio is ascribed to skilful graft
ing.
A sparrow at Colestown, Penn, built
! a nest in the running gear Of q farmers
wagon, and makes a trip to market every
week.
In the NAV of a COW killed near
Darien, Ga, a few days ago, was found
a pound of six penny nails and a five
cent piece.
With the present rate of increase as a
basis, it is estimated that a century hence
this country will have a population of
sc4, 921, 6s6.
Napoleon III. got his title, the third,
for the second never reigned, by a COM
| positor mistaking the exclamation
points-s!!i" for the Roman numerals
III.
A marine on duty at the Brooklyn
IN. w navy yard, is unable to speak
above a whisper, in consequence of hav'
ing ilabitually eaten gunpowder for
years.
The reason why fire crackers are al
ways covered with red paper is that red
is the festive color in China, and that
f~recrackers are used chiefly on festive
occasions.
The oldest man in Great Britain is
| Hugh Macleod, a Scotch c~rofter, who
was born on the 24sh of November,
1888. He lives in County Ross, and is
still healthy and vigorous.
The boundary line between the
United States and Canada is distinctly
marked from Lake Michigan to the Paci-
fc by cairns, pillars of iron, earth
mounds aud timber clearings.
Prince Herbert Bismarck eherishes
| carefully the wreck Of a watch which he
carried during the Franco-Prussian war
and which stopped q bullet that other
| wise might have ended his life,
The bones Of some prehistoric giants
have been unearthed near Admission, Ala.
One of the thigh bones was sixty-two
inches long and the skulls averaged
thirty-four inches in circumference.
The great exhibition held in London,
England, in 1851, was attended by
6,O39, 1875 persons and left a profit OF
81, 066, 525. 1t remained open from the
LIST of May to the 18th of October.
! The Pacific coast has not a complete
monopoly of big trees. There is a cypress
tree at Enterprise, Fla, that is ever ten
feet in diameter and has a trunk reach
ing up forty feet to the first branch.
Few people know OF the origin Of the
| name Bismarck. The castle of the
Chancellor's ancestors received dts name
from the 'smarca," or boundary line,
formed by the River Biese, Biese-Marca
became Bismarck.
A queer white and red robin aston
ishes the fishermen at Qnonochoutaug,
K. /. It has built it's nest in q shaggy
reach of pasture near tha laundering
ocean breakwater. The birds body is
of a snowy white, even to ting tip of its
tail, except its breast, which is Of q rosy
red.
The food of a sszoo" hippopotamus is
estimated to be about two hundred
pounds a day IN weight, and consists
chiefly OF hay, grass and roots. The
daily provender of giraffe weighs about
fifty pounds. The lions and tigers OBJ.
tain about eight or nine pounds Of meat
a day.