Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-09-11
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

| -Ine Kilt Is doomed ln'Ocotldnu.
The Treasury watch is composed of 70
veteran soldiers.
! In the town of Orneville, Me-, the au-
thorities cannot find any one to collect the
town taxes.
1t is estimated that Delaware farmers
will receive 81, 600 COO for peaches this season,
despite low prices.
| Seven farmers at Loudon Center, Me-.
have received for board from 175 city board
| ers this summer more than 81 800
And still another sleeper. 1t is an
| Ohio girl again. and she has been in an al
most continuous slumber since early last
| week.
"A sunfower plant in the yard of Chi
cago railroad magnate Is bearing "a bios
SONS. The plant is growing within 200 feet
| OF michigan boulevard.
Enough cider has been made in Eastern
Pennsylvania this season, saws a Reading
| dispatch, to fill the Schuylkill to its brim
were that river to go dry.
-Pachaug pond in Griswold is the prize
piekerel pond of Connecticut. In one week
this season ], 800 pounds of pickerel and
perch were taken from it.
1t is singular fact that the four States
having the smallest average Of wealth, Ala
bama, North Carolina Mississippi, and South
Carolina, are all Democratic.
The United States surveying party in
Alaska finds that the richest of the gold
fields of the Yukon do not belongto u.s. but
are on the British side of the line.
The rather remarkable fact is noted
that 5000 places in Chicago take out inter-
nal revenue license to sell liquor, while but
5000 take out city license for the same pur-
pose.
Two large redwood trees growing side
by side support the timbers and rails of a
railroad in Sonoma county, Cal. 1t is at a
point where the road crosses a ravine IS
feet high.
There is man living in Missouri who
has driven 4s 600 head of sheep to Hannibal
within the past 80 years, and he expects TO
keep up the same lick for 10 or l5 years
longer
In the country around Seneca, Kas., the
wolves are getting astonishingly bold, and it
is no uncommon thing for the prosperous
farmer to find gaunt specimen peering in
at his door.
One of the largest logs ever cut in the
State of Washington was foated down the
Snoqualmie river last week. 1t was a fir
log % feet long and 50 inches in diameter at
the larger end.
The first large quantity of American
sponges ever sent to European markets was
recently shipped from Philadelphia The
lot comprised 5000 pounds each OF two kinds
of sponges from the Florida coast.
The fruit of the cherry laurel has been
found by DIR. Krauss, of Halle, to increase at
the rate of 80 per cent at night ana 10 per
cent by day, while apples increase so per
cent at night and 20 per cent in daytime.
British soldiers on active service will
in future wear a card tackled in their cloth
ing giving the name, rank and regiment Of
the wearer. This is for the purpose of identi-
fcation when the survivors are carrying or
the dead.
The petrifed body ofwhat was supposed
to have been an Indian was unearthed near
McKeesport, this State, on Saturday, by men
who were digging trench A large collec-
tion of arrow heads, a flint hatchet, etc.,
were also found.
Indians on the Red River reservation
in Wisconsin are now harvesting wild rice,
which will be mammoth crop this year.
Indians harvest it in boats, threshing it
after it dries Many families live upon
it almost entirely.
In the manufacturing line paper bids
fair to supplant wood in the manufacture of
boxes, buckets, packing cases and many
other articles. 1t is much lighter than wood,
and can be made fire proof, to say nothing Of
its cheapness.
There is something about the cedar logs
that are now being exhumed in Cape May
county, N j., and that are said to have been
buried for more than 1000 years, that i'm
parts a soft and melodius tone to violin,
and the logs are being cut up for the making
OF such instruments.
The two largest driving belts ever made
in the United States are now being manu-
factured in st. Louis for an electric power
station. They are of three thicknesses of
leather, each y inches wide and l5O feet
long. They weigh about l,s00 pound each
and each belt contains about 200 tanned
hides.
"A deposit of what is known as fossil
flour" has been recently discovered in Maine
which will resist the action of acids, alkalies
and oils and is q remarkable non-conductor
of heat 1t will be used in the manufacture
of rubber goods 1t contaius % per cent Of
pure silica and when mined 1t comes out as
O fine powder.
limitation gold is a new compound
which was recently discovered and which
puzzles the best jewellers to detect. Its
weight is that of gold and the acid tests are
the same, except that the acid bOils a trife
when applied to it. although when it is
wiped of no spot is left. 1t is cheap and is
easily worked. Its chief factor is aluminium
composite, from to per cent.
The idea of drugging cows to increase
their production of milk is so repulsiVe that
there will be little regret expressed at the
failure of an experiment carried out in
France by NJ. Cornevin, who administered
philocarpine as likely to increase the secre-
tions. He found, after several trials, that
the drug had no influence upon the quantity
of milk though the constituents were af-
fected, notably in an increase of sugar.
"A spider is the novel pet of a Laings-
burg, Mich, girl. He is kept under q goblet
and carefully fed, positively refusing to be-
gin a meal until three or four flies have been
thrust into his apartment. These he let's
walk around him and even over him. allow
ing them to think him perfectly harmless,
until in some of their trips under his nose,
he apparently wakes up and grabs them,
After one of these meals he loses his appe-
tite for about 48 hours.
"A wife, living on the outskirts of San
Francisco, wanting to send information Of
the sudden illness of the baby to her hus-
band whose place of business was five miles
distant entrusted the message to one of the
family's carrier pigeons. The bird not only
delivered it safely, so the San Francisco
Examiner relates, but brought back a small
vial of medicine which the husband tied to
its leg All this was done in about 20 min
ntes or less time than it would have taken
physician to journey to the house