Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-07-23
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

| 1t has been calculated that the actual
amount of salt contained in the ocean would
| cover an area of 5, 600 square miles with a
| layer one mile thick.
"A young man who was barely able to
read and write when he went to the Kansas
| penitentiary some years ago now teaches
the highest class in that institution.
The latest Improvements in the long dis
tance telephones have raised the question of
| the probability of their being put into opera
tion between this country and Europe.
The e5 and e2 pieces struck in the
| jubilee year have evidently not taken the
public fancy, as no application was received
| for them during the whole of last year.
The celebrated military balloon works
| in Paris has produced an aerial "torpedo
boat" of which one has been bought by the
| Russian Government The trials will be
| secret.
The people of the duchy of Gotha are
| happy over the fourishing state of their
public finance. So plethoric has the treas
ury become that a bill has been introduced
in the House of Representatives suspending
all taxation for three months.
"A French provincial newspaper has been
condemned to pay 200 francs damage for
calling several residents of its town Free
Masons. To call a man a Free Mason in
France is to bring him into hatred, ridicule
and contempt of his Roman Catholic towns
men.
Washington is the only city of its size
in the United States which has no factory
girls. Women who earn their living there
are principally in politics, though there are
O few employed in retail stores, Photographic
studios and private offices. In Washington
tenement house life is unknown.
Joseph Adams, of Kennebunkport,
who is 80 years of age, has never been in a
steam or horse car, never was on board of q
steamboat, and never Travelled farther East
than Portland nor farther West than York
in his life, having always lived upon the
farm where he was born.
An unknown animal is killing the dogs
near Danville, KY, by cutting hole in the
throat and sucking the blood out of the
body. 1t is said to be an immense white ami
NAL unlike anything ever before seen. 1t is
of the greyhound pattern, but larger in
every way, being about feet high and
long.
Many years ago an ocean steamship
made only 10 or IL revolutions of the engine,
using only five pounds of steam pressure.
With this she averaged about eight knots.
High-powered ships OF the present day use
36 times this pressure and make times the
revolutions. Their speed is only ~ times as
great.
"A vase, which it has taken four years
to complete, has just been sent to London
from the Minton China Mandatory. 1t was
made by NJ. Tolon, is valued at E1, 500 and is
considered the handsOmest thing of the
kind that has ever been made. Venus Bac-
chus and IA group of Cupids are represented
In the design.
"A recent departure in obtaining extra
draught for furnaces on steamships without
the use of blowers or other devices has been
successfully tried on the Scot of the Cape
Mail line. This vessel has been furnished
with smokestacks 126 feet high above the
CRATES. The increased draught is equivalent
to a water pressure of three fOurths OF an
inch. The vessels speed is 10 knots.
Mr. Romanes, of London, has an ape
that he has taught to count-not very far
up, indeed, but as high as five. He knows
the numbers and the words that indicate
them. His method is to take straws one by
one into his mouth until one less than the
required number have been collected: then,
ia king up an additional straw. he hands it
over, together with the in his mouth.
An Alabama girl actually laughed her
self to death. After the laughing, which was
provoked by funny happening to her
brother, had lasted for some time. her parents
advised her to stop, but she couldn't. They
then threw cold water on her, but, as this
had no effect they sent for physician He
arrived to find the girl unconscious and in
few minutes she died from exhaustion
1t has been demonstrated that, while
the greatest velocity impaired to a cannon
ball scarcely exceeds 800 metres second
about l,500 miles an hOur-meteors from
space penetrate the air with velocity it fs
claimed, of 10000 sometimes $4,000, metres
per second. This tremendous speed raises
the temperature of the air at once to 900 or
5000 centigrade, causing in many cases the
complete destruction of the meteorite by
combustion.
Some of the most prominent iron found
ers are introducing a new and simple prac-
tice in order to secure stronger castings, the
method in question consisting in placing
thin sheets of wrought iron in the center Of
the mold previous to the operation of cast
ing. This method was first resorted to- it ap-
pears, in the casting of thin plates for the
ovens of cooking stoves it being found that
q sheet of thin iron in the center of a quar-
ter-inch oven plate rendered it practically
unbreakable by fire.
According to the latest official Japan
ese census the population of that country on
January 81, last, was 4OO72, ,O2O OF which 90
245, 1886 were males and 10, ,s25, ,6S4 females. The
number of inhabited houses was 7s4O,s72,
giving about five to each family. There
were 3, ,S25 mobiles of whom 593 were the heads
of families: 1,993 637 shizoka, or members of
the old military class, of whom 49, All were
the heads of families, and IS, ,074, SIS common
people," 7,736,764 being heads of families
There were 7,+45, ,ll9 married couples.
I'm the National Cemetery at Pittsburg
Landing there are $500 Union soldiers and
four women buried in the cemetery. The
latter were nurses in the army, who con-
tracted diseases while at work in the hos
pitals, died and were buried in the ceme-
terry. Every other grave is marked with a
headstone, but the graves of the women
were entirely ignored. Someone had planted
an evergreen or so over their graves, but
otherwise they are unmarked. No one
seems to know why the graves had been
neglected, save that the War Department.
directed that no tOmbstOnes should be
erected. There must be an interesting bit
of history connected with the matter, if one
had time and opportunity to look it up, and
some women's society might start an inves-
tigatfon.
A strange bird, which has attracted the
attention of hundreds of people, is on exhi-
bition on the farm of John ROdabaugh,
farmer living six miles east of st. Mary's, o.
The bird resembles an owl very much in
FORM has a head shaped like a heart, the
face of q monkey snowy white fur adorn-
ing its face, while the feathers are of beau
tiful and delicate yellowish gray, with the
tail OF turkey. The bird was caught a few
weeks ago, while the family were returning
home from church, and not until it had re-
ceived load of shot did it allow itself to be
taken captive, and then it's captor was fear
fully lacerated in the fight that ensued. 1t
utters a noise similar to that of the squeal of
q pig, and is fed wholly on small birds,
which 1t takes into its beak alive, throwing
out the bones and feathers afterward-