Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-08-15
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

to be photographed.
The ffiatican contains POS staircases and
LOO different rooms.
New York City consumes daily about
$1,000 punches of asparagus.
The cost of burying the late Grand
Duke Nicholas of Russia was 100000
"A silver casket from the Queen is said
to be one of the most treasured household
gods of Mr.. Spurgeon.
"A deed conveying piece of land from
Kish-Ka-Nuck-Kuck to Sho-Me-No-Po was re-
corded the other day at AtchisOn.
"A Portsmouth, N H., woman recently
found a Icent piece in an egg which one Of
her hens had laid, and later on the same hen
laid an e2g with 10cent piece in it.
Thomas Morris, colored man Of Stuart,
Va, claims to be no years old. He is the
father of 4s children and has been married
five times, but all his wives are dead
On the summit of Ben Lomond may be
seen the smallest tree that grows in Great
Britain. 1t is known as the dwarf willow,
and is, when mature, only about two inches
in height.
M. Tisserand has said that there are in
France 6,9l3 500 cultivators, who are divided
into 3,463, go proprietors, farmers and metay-
ers, and 3,452,9O ordinary laborers, bailiffs
and farm servants.
"A pathological statistician calculates
that in the year 1000 there will be 1,700 900 900
people who speak English. and that the
only 500 OO0, 900 people.
The artificial incubation of eggs orig
mated in Egypt, where 1t is still carried on.
According to q consular report no fewer
than 75000,0OO eggs are Matched in this way
every year on the banks of the Nile.
The largest grapevine in the world il
that growing at Oys, Portugal, which has
been bearing since 1SO2. Its maximum Yield
was in 1884, in which year it. produced q suf-
noient quantity OF grapes to make 165 gall
Ions of wine.
divers in the clear waters of the trop-
ical seas find that fish of different colors
when frightened do not all dart in the same
direction but that each different kind takes
shelter i'll that portion of the submarine
growth nearest in color to that of the fish.
The biggest doctors fee of the age is the
100000 marks paid by Her Won Donner, a
Hamburg merchant, for DR.. Michelsen's cure
of his wife. The money wasn't given to the
famous WieSbaden practitioner, however,
but, at his wish, to found hospital in Ham,
burg.
-Vergennes, VT, is the third oldest city
in the United States, having been chartered
in 1888. Hartford and New Haven, Conn.,,
were chartered in 1884. Vergennes is proba-
bly, the smallest and most quiet city in the
country, having population of 1,TS and
covering only LOO acres.
I'm big trees the new State of Washing
ton is quite rich. A Seattle paper mentions
a fir in Sumas which is 81 feet in diameter.
Near Stanwood there is cedar II feet in
diameter 80 feet from the roots and II feet in
diameter liz feet from the roots. Nooksack
reports a fir II feet in diameter.
Wild horses are sociable in character
and protect themselves against carnivorous
beasts by herding together in large num-
bers. In face of any great danger, such as
storms and fires, they unite in still larger
bodies, perhaps from sentiment akin to
the human one at similar crises.
The ancient Egyptians were not partic-
ular about the wraps in which to shroud
their dead Old napkins, old skirts and
other cast-of clothing were so utilized. It
is said that IN unpaid dentist bill was found
on the person of lately exhumed mummy,
whose teeth were in extra fine condition.
The hide of the former Cincinnati sle-
plant, Old Chief, which was shot last Feb
ruary, has been stuffed, and with the
mounted skeleton of the brute, will be
housed in a special building at the Cincin-
natl Geological Garden. The hide weighs
LOO pounds, and it has been stuffed with
oakum.
"A new Swedish glass is claimed to,have
important advantage for microscope and
other fine lenses, giving greatly increased
power. The chief Improvement over other
fine glass consists in the addition OF phos-
phate and chlorine, which impart absolute
transparency, great hardness andssusceptt-
bility of the finest polish.
All Esquimaux are superstitious about
death, and, although they hold festivities in
memory OF departed friends, they will usu-
hut. there to drag out his remaining days
without food, medicine, water or attend
ance. After the death of a husband or a
wife the survivor cuts the front hair shOrs
and fasts for % days.
The most unhappy period of marriage,
according to French divorce statistics, is for
the period extending from the fifth to fhe
tenth year. After that the figures drop rap
idly. Only % per cent of couples seek d.
vOrce between the tenth and twentieth
years of unions Only one pair in a hundred
seeks to cut the knot after the period of over
80 and under 40 years.
The splendid Mozart Centenary Festi-
val at Salzburg recalls to the memory how
the great composer died in December, I79l.
He finished his days in the top fat ofa house
in one of the po crest streets of the city. He
left 60f in money, and the sale of his effects
realized 201, or about 35s. He was laid in q
pauper's grave, marked by a plain wooden
cross, and nobody knows now where thab
grave is.
The largest sum ever paid for single
novel is said to have been 100000 to AL
phonse Daudet, for "Sappho," published in
1884, Eighty thousand dollars was received
was Victor Hugo for lies Miserables" (ls62),
published in ten languages. Lord Beacons-
field received S60,0C0 each for "Endymion"
and .'Lothair." George Eliot received Sc, 900
for "Middlemarch," and Charles Dickens
S37, 500 for Edwin Brood"
"A novel plan for extinuguishing a
church debt has been hit upon in Melbourne.
The church comnlittee-or vestry, as the
case may be-divide the total debt among
themselves and each man insures his life for
the amount that falls to his share. The pol
icies are transferred to the church, and the
annual payments on them are made out of
the collections. Then, of course, as the
members of the committee "drop off," the
sums insured on their lives drop in, and
later, when the last committeeman is dead,
the last installment of the church debt is
paid. The plan has the merIt-if merit il be
of throwing the whole of the responsibility
for the continuance of the indebtedness
upon Providence.