Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-02-19
CURIOUS CONVERSATIONS.

There are now living in Germany no
fewer than 52s,9s7 Mullers.
All the coal at present consumed in the
Austrian navy comes from England.
"A Russian can plead infancy for long
time, as he does not come OF age till he is 26
years old.
A Laurens county (Ga-) farmer claims
to have pig which has eight legs, four ears
and two tails.
"A wild grape vine was cut down in
Iowa that had a trunk Is inches in circnm-
ference one foot above the ground.
There is man in Ohio WHO, it is said,
is in the habit, when eating meat, of deyour-
ing such bones as he may find in it,
"A baby, months old and weighing but
four pounds is reported from Georgia. 1t is
said to be perfectly healthy "ano the best
"A German inventor is reported to have
devised an ingenious camera for taking pho
tographs of the internal organs Of human
beings and beasts.
"A Coroner's jury in Peoria, Ill, brought
in the following verdict one day last week:
Eve find that the deceased came to her
death by being found dead in her bed.''
The first notice of India rubber on
record was given by Herrera, who, in the
second voyage OF Columbus, observed that
the natives Of Haiti ''played a game with
balls made of the gum of q tree"
The star fish turns himself inside out.
and wraps his food round him, and stays
that way until he has had enough The
prongs of the star fish look like teeth, really
they are not being nothing but ornaments
to his person.
GA house is still standing in North Cas-
t1ne, says the Kennebec Journal, (which
was built Immediately after the close of the
Revolutionary War. In 1874 it was occupied
as headquarters of the British officers and
from 1870 to 1920 as public house.
I'm Japan there is an aseidian (Cvnthia)
which is as large as ones first 1t has no
shell whatever, and is a gray, f1abby. tulip-
shaped sac. supported on a short stalk But
in spite of all its forbidding appearance the
Japs pickle 1t In vinegar and use it'as food
The curator of the Colombo Museum
has discovered that carboiized oil is one of
the most perfect preservatives of the coIors
of fish and other animal specimens The
most delicate frogs, snakes and geckoes re-
tain their eVanescent tints when kept in it.
1t is stated that there are more priests.
monks and nuns in Jerusalem, in propor-
tion to the population. than in anv other
city In the world. They belong to every
natlon OF EUROPE and many OF Asia, and
are OF every creed, form of worship and
dress. ~
The robes of Queen Victoria are never
sold or given away, despite the energetic at
tempts which have been made, from time to
time, to induce the attendants to part with
some Of these thousands OF gowns, which
the1r wearer has probably forgotten that she
ever possessed.
Almost every railroad company has a
device or motto which is printed on the
time table folders, the letter heads and the
i ur 0iT,. ted rdx hot horo tho
stations, waiting room and business offices.
These devices are usually printed in cSIors
and some of them are quaint and clever.
The action of the NexcastIe-on-Tyne
local gas company in reducing the price of
gas to 45 cents per LOCO feet probably makes
this the lowest priced gas to be found any
where. In addition to this consumers are to
continue to enjoy the usual allowance of 10
per cent in their bills for prompt payment.
The manufacture of sleigh bells in the
East has, from time to time, within the past
ten years diminished until now it is only
about one-tenth in magnitude of what it was
a decade ago. The apparent reason for this
which are now the rule, rather than the ex-
ception.
I'm Persia, lambs a week old, and
weighing only few pounds, are roasted
whole and stuffed with dates, raisins, chest
nuts, pistachios and almonds sherbet, in
large china bowls, is always served at
dinner 1t consists of fruit-syrups or eau
sucree; it is usually iced, and is drunk from
large wooden spoons
-Berlin's richest citizen has an annual
income of s75O0OO. But two persons in Prus-
,ia paying an income tax are richer A man
said to be a Rothschild) in Weisbaden is
taxed on an income OF 81, GOO 900. and another
said to be Krupp) in Dusseldorf is taxed on
81 100000 Krupp stands at the top in the
l2sth class of income taxpayers
"A North Carolina tourist, IN Cuba, had
his watch stolen on the street. In less than
two hours a police judge had sentenced
the robber to three years imprison-
Inent. He also awarded the North
Jury sustained by his watch in the strug-
yle for IT'S possession, and ordered the con-
vict to work it out.
The wonderful and welll-known faculty
Of mimicry gossessed by monkeys makes
hem excellent subjects for Thespian train
ng. Several apes of the common order are
,old annually from the Geological Gardens
% impressarios of the Simian stage. The
7alue of them depends almost entirely on
heir powers of attention, which vary
greatly even in Inherent members of the
same species.
A most interesting relic, which British
Columbia proposes to send to the Worlds
Fair, is the wreck OF the old Hudson Bay
Jompany's steamboat Beaver which was
he first steamboat to stir the waters of the
Pacific of the North American coast. The
wreck OF the Beaver lies with its nose on
he shore and its stern in about u feet of
vater at tine entrance to Vancouver harbor,
Vhere it was run aground and abandoned in
s35.
BY far the most intelligent denizens of
he deep are the dolphin and the porpoise,
nd long and careful examination of two of
he latter which formerly inhabited the
lrge tank at the Brighton Aquarium
roved them to be not only tameaDle and
ven sociable as regards man, but also to
ossess social likes and dislikes, and great
with regard to other inhabit-
nts of what they considered their particu-
II domain
Two men in the employ of Councillor
hepherd, builder and contractor, of Cardiff
.ade an extraordinary discovery in the
.oyaI Hotel building yard. They were en-
aged in saving a huge block of stone from
,e uuarries neaI Bath, when the saw cut
rough bees nest almost in the center OF
he stone. Some of the bees were crushed to
cath, but the living ones came swarming
ut, frightening the stonecutters, who beat
hasty retreat.