Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-01-08
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

4 H
1 ness in human life.
A railway to Jerusalem viii be COM
| pleted in next April.
The smallest shoe shop in New York is
feet inches square
More fruit is probably imported into
London than any other city in the world.
In Colorado the Southern Pacific Rail-
road is ballasted for some distance with
| rock salt.
Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina
each has two species of lizard provided with
| three eyes.
"A stick of timber 2Ox2Ox91 feet was re-
| Gently cut in Oregon and shipped to San
Francisco.
"A Georgia convict cannot get out, al
though his term has expired. The prison
| records say he is dead, and there is no pro-
vision Tor releasing a dead man.
There are now colored women law
yers, a doctors. 6 civil engineers, 10 pro-
tographers and 80 artists. There are also liz
colored women pursuing studies abroad q,
i nTexas there is stone about 20 feet in
diameter that has wonderful magnetic
power. 1t is said that it will draw ham
mer or an ak to its surface even when placed
10 to ID feet away on the ground.
There are some curious things in Yellow
| stone Park, among which is hole which
! has no bottom that has vet been reached.
"A line has been dropped down nearly 1000
feet and yet it did not touch bottom.
The civil service records of the past
| three years show that out of the number OF
men applicants examined for Governments
offices only a little over one-haIf passed
while four-ffths of the women applicants
passed.
Soda water is an American drink. 1t is
as essentially American as porter, Rhine
wine and claret are dist1netively English,
German and French. The most interesting
fact in the manufacture of soda water is that
it contains no soda.
"A firm in San Francisco recently re-
ceived from life prisoner in the San Quen-
tin. Cal, prison, check for $50. 1t was in
| payment for goods that he bought from the
house "a years ago-iust prior to committing
the deed for which he is imprisoned.
I'm Northern Africa date stones are
roasted and used as substitute for coffee.
All kinds of basket and wicker work are
made from the leaf stalks, while the leaves
themselves are made into mats bags, etc.;
the wood is used for fences and buildings.
"A 13-year-old Maine girl. who is lum-
bering at Moro, with the assistance of her
father, loaded on a team 324 logs and hauled
them to the landing, some distance away,
where she unloaded them and returned for
more. She was just 26 days hauling the
324 pieces
-"While at her cooking the other day.
relates the Fernandina Fla, Neacs, "Phillis
Kelly, colored, broke an egg open, when an
other distinct egg about the size of a marble
and with hard she'll, was found in the
yolk. 1t was sent to the Ne10s Office for in
spection."
The reed swarps of the Guadiana river,
in Southern Spain, are all alive with migra-
tory birds in November and the water fowl
of Northern Russia winter on the shores of
the Caspian, where snow storms may occur
now and then, but where water birds are, on
the whole, mach better of than on the desert
coasts further south.
In old times rhinoeeros horns were en-
ployed for drinking cups by royal person
ages, the notion being that poison put into
them would show itself by bubbling- There
may have been some truth in the idea, mas
much as many of the ancient poisons were
acids and they would decompose the horny
material very quickly.
DOUBTLESS the first dogs which were
trained to serve mankind were the jacSal5
OF Asia, which are to this day very intelli-'
gent and docile when tanned There was q
kind of dog kept by the ancient Egyptians
which was evidently obtained by breeding
| from slenderly built species that is wild in
| Africa at the present time.
Much speculation has been INDUCED in
| as to the nature of the glow-worm's light,
which is not put out by water rnor seemingly
capable of giving forth any heat. 1t has
been asserted that the light diffusing SUBJ
stance contains phosphorus but this has
never been proved. Certainly it is incap-
able of communicating ignition to any
thing.
During the early part of this century
and previously the official tax gatherers on
the Island of Hawaii, in the Sandwich group,
did all their accounts on a rope 2.40O feet
long, which was divided into lengths. each
corresponding to a district. Loops, knots
and feather tufts along the rope served as
memoranda for the hogs, pigs, and pieces Of
sandal wood collected from taxpayers.
The single tribe of the Betsi Fangs, in
the Kongo country, according to De Brazza,
numbers over 1000, 900 souls. Their most i'm
portant villages are from three to ten miles
back from the rivers. Father Lejeune esti-
mates that along the Ogowe river from LAM
barene to Ndyole there are 100000 Fangs.
But all the rivers forming network through
the country are in the possession of this
race.
"a live manatee or sea cow was caught
in Biscayne Baya few days ago. reports the
Eustis Lake, Fla, Region. at gave its cap
tors lively time and some hard work to get
IL across the BAY Sometimes it came along
as ouiet as a lamb after being exhausted by
ire efforts TO escaDe. Then, when Somew hat
rested il would break away, and, to prevent
SMamDing their little DOat, Gney WOuIu nave
to give it rope and let it run awhile.
in 1887, when the English started on
their expedition to Abyssinia. they carried
with them a goodlv supply of bright, new
Maria Theresa dollars coined for them in vi
emma but this coin met well-defined mis-
trust on the part of the natives, since it
looked so surprisingly new. Yet the Maria
Theresa dollar is the only available one in
ali this mart of the Dark Continent. The
connuering tour of this coin was achieved
with remarkable rapidity.
Six intimate friends, three young men
and three young women, in Louisville, two
wears ago, agreed among themselves that
one should not marry unless the other did.
A wear later. one of the Young men and one
of fine Young women became engaged to
on ch other but as the others were yet ap-
narently heart free they could not marry
Six months later another couple agreed to
ioin their lots for life, but then came
frouble The third young man was willing
TO marry but the third young woman was
not This drove the other two couples
nearly wild, and they frantically reproached
tne reluctant maiden for keeping them out
of happy matrimony. Finally, few weeks
ago she Welded and on New Years Eve the
three couples were married