Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-04-05
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

CUhlVUS NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
There are nearly 5000 stitches in q pair
Of hand-sewn boots.
-wolverhampton has q bullock with q
wooden leg and good appetite.
"A Maine boy Of years is said to be
able to repeat 40 chapters Of tie Bible.
The Emperor of China has ten men
whose sole duty is to carry his umbrella.
The contractor who built an Indiana
Jail now occupies one of its cells as pris-
oner.
French reporters now take notes at
night by the light of q tiny incandescent
lamp attached to the pencil.
There is a brisk trade in secondhand
tombstones in London. Still stranger is the
custom OF selling family vaults partly nlled.
1t is reckoned that the British feet,
which numbered 2,14O guns, fired away 49,
900 pounds of powder during the battle Of
Trafalgar.
Paris is now the best lighted city in the
world, and model for all cities that are
bent on introducing electric lighting on
grand scale.
Careful investigation in Prussia reveals
the remarkable fact that the average life of
Jews in Prussia is five years longer than
that OF Christians.
"A fine collection of seventeenth century
tobacco-pipes has just been found under an
old London cellar and deposited in the
Guildhan Museum.
The Rothschild family, of Europe, says
Herr F1urscheim, the German economist. is
estimated to be worth 81, ,OOO O0O, 900, and their
income to be $35, ,000, 600.
The old troublesome question of how to
<<fr IDo,
thanks mainly to the subways. there are abb
solutely no obstructive wires.
I'm no three large cities in Europe have
greater advances in sanitation been shown
during the last 20 years than in the cities of
Bombay, Madras and Calcutta.
According to law of nature, when a
body is cooled it becomes heavier than when
it is hot. There is one exception to the rule,
however, and that is in the case of water.
The latest whim for the owners of dogs
is to make them wear shoes in the house for
the purpose of protecting the polished floors.
They are made of chamois, with leather
soles.
Out of $4,000 persons engaged in cabi-
net making in London, 4o00 are foreigners.
Some estimates place the Hebrew popula-
tion in East London at 10000, another estf-
mate places it at $1,000.
1t is interesting to learn that the whole
of the magnificent Drocades. velvets and
silks for the costumes in the Lyceum yer-
sion Of Henry VIII. were woven in English
looms by English workmen-
Black snow lately fell in the Canton of
Geneva, Swirzerland-a phenomenon which
was once thought to presage the black plague
and other calamities, but is now known to be
due to a fungus in the snow.
The total force in the naval service
i'll z, o5n
whom 30 020 were between the ages of Is and
"a, 1870 between 25 and 35, 5l50 between So
and As, and $40 above 45 years OF age
There are 25 railway tunnels in En-
land between one and two miles long, four
over two miles, two just three miles, and
one-the Severn, on the Great Western
Railway-is over four and a half miles long.
The proposed plan for the postal tube
between France and England is to suspend
by means OF steel cables thrown across the
Channel, R0 feet above the level of the
water.
"A gold coin passes from one to an
other 9, GOO O90, eco times before the stamp or
impression upon it becomes obIiterated by
friction, while silver coin changes between
$3.50, ,000, COO times before it becomes entirely
effaced.
-London's latest fad, the green carnation,
mon carnation and paint brush,' practi-
cal illustration of painting the lily which is
financially as profitable as the m1lk-fed
sQuasheS they sometimes raise up in Dakota
to startle the tenderfoot. 80.
-Catarrh and lung troubles make the
residence of apes in Northern Europe only
a brief pathway to the grave. Edgar Aka,
the noted Paris chfnpauzee, has recently
died OF consumption, and the successor to
"Sally' in the London Geological Garden has
a cough which is almost human.
Mulberry wood, the Doylestown, Pa,
bteHigencer asserts, is the most durable ma
terial of which to make fence posts. 1t tells
of farm near Strode's mill, Chester county,
fenced with this material 95 years ago. the
posts being still in good condition They
now support their 18th set of rails.
The pocket umbrella has not yet ar
rived, but q Florida negro was outi the
rain few days ago under combination hat
and umbrella. 1t was his own manufacture,
made of palmetto, and was about three feet
in diameter. He walked about in Florida
downpour without getting wet at all
Mail carriers in Morocco are said to
avoid the risk of losing their places by over
sleeping by tying a string to one foot and
setting the end of it on fire before going to
sleep. The string, they know from expert
ence, will burn so long, and when the fire
reaches their foot it is time for them to get
up.
in the most advanced Continental glass
manufactures glass blowing is no longer
done by the mouth but by compressed air.
Lead mixing is done by workmen wearing
mask in which are inserted sponges on u
level with the nose and mouth. 1t is in this
Iaanufa ctory that the glass panes perforated
in conical-shaped apertures to admit the air
are made.
In former times it was esteemed highly
improper for single or unmarried persons to
wear rings, 'unless they were judges. doc
tors or Senator'S" For all but these digni-
tarie5 such an unwarranted ornaInent was
considered an evidence of vanity, lasclvl-
business and pride" and was looked upon as
a treat piece of presumption on the part,of
the wearcr. .---
The earliest authentic account of lace is
about the sixth century, when high-born
Italian nuns wrought it for the adornment
of the sanctuary Even before the English
nuns were famed for the very open English
work. wonderfully lacey in effect. Monks
as we'll as nuns give their minds to it. St,
Dunstan himself did not think it deroga tory.
to make designs for the convent workers
I'm Pelham's collection of Travels
rsoc,. referring, to one of the Pacific islands.
mention is made of woman who was seen
shaving a child's head with a sharks tooth
fastened into the end of a stick. The hair
was first wetted with rag dipped in water,
and then, by q proper application of the In
strunent she completed the business as
etfectually as if a razor had been employed.
JINGLES AND JOKELETS.
Miss Giddy-I wonder what kind of