Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-06-08
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.


-Forty-nine per cent of the days in Lon
don are wet.
-Nsturalists say that q single swallow
will devour 5000 flies in day
The Chinese gardeners are the most e1-
pert fruitgrowers in the world
A German scientist holds that 1t IL
from meteors that all our diamonds come.
1t is now the fashion in New York high
society to hire affairs for use at home we'd
dilgs.
"A Russian can plead infancy for long
time, as he does not come OF age until ne Is
26 years old.
Foreign physicians are now experiment
ing with frog lymph as q preventive Of
hydropnobia.
A San Francisco publisher has adopted
a nickelin-the-slot machine through which
to sell his papers.
In some species of the sheep it takes
1900 of their hairs laid side by side to cover
an inch on the rule.
"A German scientist has proved that the
character OF their food affects the color Of
the piumage OF birds.
From the beginning to the end OF the
War of the Rebellion there were 26s, ,0CO deser-
tions from the Union armies.
The speed of the fastest railway is not
much more than half that Of the golden
eagles flight. The bird often makes 1AO
miles an hour.
So Light is the spiders web that
pound weight of it will reach around the
world and then leave enough to reach from
New York to San Francisco.
During the past year !, ,057 destructive
fires have been caused by illuminants
lighted with Matches while electricity has
only caused 81 confagrations.
Scientists estimate that every year a
layer equal to IA feet deep of the surface Of
oil oceans and other bodies of water is taken
up into the atmosphere as vapor.
The Red Sea is for the most part blue
1t gets its name from the fact that portions
of it are covered by minute animalcula
which die the surface of the water red
where they float.
"A Jersey COW at Huntsville, Ala, it is
Said. has broken the record as a rich milk
ter having already been made, with four
more days to end her years test.
"A single grain of musk has been known
to perfume room for 20 years. At che low
est computation that grain of musk must
have been divided into 800 00O, 600 900 900 par.
ticles, each of them capable OF affecting the
olfactory organs.
Scarcely month has elapsed since the
concluding shipment of a plant, the first of
its kind in the Celestial Empire, which Will
enable the Chinese to smelt their own iron,
to roll their own rails, plates, bars, etc, Of
either iron or steel.
"A ray of light which would travel
around the earth in about one-eighth of a
second takes more than four hours to come
from Neptune. For Alpha Centauri, the
nearest fixed star, light makes the journey
In five and One-half years.
The floating island in Satawga Lake,
near the town OF Whittingham, VT. is justly
regarded as ono of the greatest curiosities
in the Eastern States. 1t contains about 100
acres OF fertile land, and is sometimes found
in one quarter of the lake and then again in
another
AN ingenious Belgian has patented a
simple arrangement by which two blocks of
cork can be securely clamped into an ordi-
nary horseshoe. The cork it Is claimed,
lasts as long as the shoe itself, and renders
slipping on greasy or frosty pavements i'm
possible.
The most beautiful crabs in the world
are procured In the neighborhood of thu
Farallone Islands, Off the Pacific coast
They are called "red rock crabs" and speci-
mems sometimes sell in the markets OF San
Francisco for from S. to $40 each, merely for
curiosities.
AN Astoria, S. F., fisherman has a tame
sea lion, which follows his boat as dog trots
behind its master. He brought up baby
sea lion in a net one day during the fishing
season, and the helpless little creature
bleeted so plaintively that he took it ashore
and cared for 1t.
If the eyes are tired and infamed from
loss of sleep, by sitting up late or long travel,
apply I'm the morning soft white linen, drip
ping with hot water-as hot as you can bear
,ftl3iaying the cloth upon the lids. You will
feei the eyes strong and free from pain and
distress in half an hour.
Frau Probsti, who enjoyed the distinc-
tion of being the heaviest woman in Eu-
rope, has Just died in Traubring. in Bavaria,
at the age of Al At her death she weighed
$50. and on account of her enormous weight
it was impossible to carry her coffin from
the first story of the house In which she
lived. Consequently boards were put down
the staircase, over which the coffin was slid.
in an cient times Roman merchants ad-
vertised by criers, who announced the time,
place and condition of sales. The crfer was
often O man of wit and humor, who first
gathered n crowd and entertained them, and
then passed from pleasure to business. Papy-
rus leaves of ancient Egyptians advertise
ments 5000 years old have been e1cavated,
and are now the property of the British
Museum.
There are several instances on record of
the complete destruction of whole regiments
in one battle. On September 8. 1872, Napo-
Icons Fifty-third Regiment perished to a
man in stormine over the Roman positions.
On January 6, 1912 only 65 out of "A, 500 British
soldiers emerged alive at a battle fought
near Jagdulluck. In November. 1888, the
whole army of Hicks Pasha, i, 900 strong,
was cut TO pieces near the Fifth Cataract of
the River Nile.
There are few things more amusing than
to watch a toad submitting to the operation
of q back-scratching. He will at first look
some what suspiciously at the twig which
you are advancing toward him. But after
two or three passes down his back his man
ner undergoes n marked change, his eyes
close with an expression of infinite rapture
he plants his feet wider apart and his body
swels out to nearly double its ordinary size,
as If to obtain by these means more roomfoI
enjoyment.
1t was demonstrated recently for the
first time that there is gold in the worlds OF
space as well as upon our own globe. w. H.
Turner, q geoloyist of Washington, tive
mon this ago made marvellous find during
an exploring Journey in the hill country OF
Calayeras, where he discovered q meteorlC
stone the size OF a mans fist IL was covered
and lecked throughout with gold. These
hecks scattered through the body OF INT
meteorite disposes of the objection that
may have been gold plated after falling &c
the earth.
JOKES FOR THE JovIAL.