Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1892-02-06
CURIOUS FACTS.

Parsley Is poisonous TO many KINDS oil
birds.
A cubic foot of silver weighs 657
pounds.
A fnll-grown Greenland whale yields
about a ton of whalebone.
Cricket was PLAYED under the name of
''club ball' as early as the fourteenth
century.
A parasite which kills forty grasshop-
pers an hour is to be imported in large
numbers from Australia.
A de5t OF three cents, which she has
owed for forty three years, has just been
paid by woman in Philadelphia, Penn.
The Irish Parliament existed for over
800 years. 1t was extinguishe1 in
1901 at the time of the union with Great
Britain.
A Maine girl has the faculty, when
blindfolded, of taking photograph and
accurately describing the person or OBJ
ject portrayed thereon.
A valuable find Of skeletons belonging
to the fourth dynasty was recently made
in Egypt. This is the earliest known
data of Egyptian remains.
A Pennsylvania was cured of the
effects of snake bite by the application
of galvanic battery to the nape of his
neck and the apex of the heart.
The time of building the first iron
ship Is a matter of dispute, but there is
tradition as far back as 1887 an iron
vessel was used oa the Severn River,
England.
The consumption of eggs in Paris is
something extraordinary. According to
a municipal statement the city consumed
last year no less than $4,000 tons,
equal to LAT eggs per capita.
1t has been found that dog in Salem,
Mass, is responsible for the mysterious
disappearance of articles from grocery.
He was watched and seen to carry of the
articles one by one to the house of his
master.
Dalmatan, OF coach dogs, are said to
have been first bred in Dalmatia. but it
is by tho last quoted name that they are
best known. This arises from the fact
of their being kept in stables AMI are
nearly always seen running after car
riages.
1t is said that the timber on the Kali
anna River, Washington, is so dense that
when the trees are sawed off they stand
on the stumps, not having room to fall.
A Swede recently sawed of seven trees
and is now waiting for a wind to blow
them down.
Some of our shy wood birds avoid
human habitations in their wanderings,
but the wisest go where guupowder is
dear and pass the winter in the swamp
forests of Yucatap, or even farther south
in the painless woods of Guiana and
Eastern Brazil.
Indians arc fond of the Larvae of many
insects, and they do not dispise slugs as
an article of food. Roasted crlckets are
a favoritc diet with them, particularly in
California and Utah. Grasshopers fur
nish many tribes with large part of
their subsistence.
The migratory birds of the Eastern
States have a curious habit of following
established routes of travel. Countless
thousands of water birds, for instance,
cross the Mexican border near the mouth
of the Rio Grande, probably to avoid the
broad sand wastes that skirt the upper
river valley.
The ancient Egyptians held the scara-
beus beetle in high regard, making the
number of Its toes thirty, to symbolic
the days of the month; the time it de-
posted its ball was supposed to refer to
the lunar month, and the movement of
the ball was held to represent the action
of the sun upon the earth.
There is one noticeable feature of fruit
at TETON, Cal. A few orange trees, full
of black scales, were brought from
Southern California and set out there.
In two years the trees, which grew and
flourishcd, had no scale whatever, Some
thing in the climate or soil cleanses the
trees SO that no scales or fruit pests can
ever be found there.
Father Chautard, formerly missionary
in Dahomey, says the following is the
truth about the lake of human blood
mentioned by many travellers and said to
be large enough to float canoe: sin
front Of the kings palace there are really
two holes measuring a cubic limeter
(35.316 cubic feet each. They fill these
with blood and float upon it little boat
made of silver"