The Ohio Democrat. (Logan, O. [Ohio]) 1886-1906, 1892-06-18
solENoE AND INDUSTRY.

AT Berlin in 1891 there were ,0S4,-
e2G animals slaughtered, as compared
with 1,142, 100 in 1890. Nearly 1000 ami
mails were seized as unfit for food, and,
while there was a decrease in the con-
sumption of beef, mutton and veal,
there was an increase of $4,000 in the
number OF hogs killed.
"A curious and profitable business
has grown up in the Maine woods about
the sawmills, in the utilizing of the i'm
mense quantities of sawdust by com.
preston. Thousands of tons of sawdust
are pressed into compact blocks and
bales and in this form is finding a
ready market for lindling and fuel in
| the eastern cities..-N. " Sun.
After the short American potato
crop of 1890, there were shipped to the
United States from abroad 1858, ,7O7
bushels in 1891, of which Canada and
her dependencies shipped 3,047, ,S16
bushels, Great Britain and Ireland
1908, 800, British West Indies 1886,
Germany 41,S30, and Cuba 22,34S
bushels.
AT the Hyde Park meeting Of do
mestis servants, male and female, con-
vencd by the London Domestic Serv-
ants union, the secretary gave the esti.
mate that there were 10000 domestic
servants walking about the streets un.
employed. The last census returns
$4,000 coachmen and grooms, $4,000
male domestic servants indoors, and
| $50. GOO female domestic servants, OF
1859, 600 in all.
| Il
Providence there is u new and impor-
tant industry in the cultivation of sisal
grass, which is equal to Manila hemp
for making rope and twine. The fiber
plant. which was formerly regarded as
noxious weed. requires four years to
reach maturity, and tens of thousands
of acres of land of New Providence are
now devoted to its growth. The first
big shipment of it will be made to this
country this year.
Prof. Charles d. Walcott of the
United States geological survey intends
to have at the worlds fair an exhibit
which will illustrate section of the
earth's crust by specimens of the rock
strata placed in their proper relative
positions, and by collections of the char
acteristic fossils shown in connection
| with the formations in which they are
found.
A comparative auatomist says that
the little toe has got to GO that it is use
less appendage already showings signs
of degeneration or whitening away. 1t
is proved that the horse in the course of
several centuries has dropped four toes
and now travels on one, and some think
that mans pedal eXtremities are bound
to follow similar line of evolution. In
the horse it is the middle digit which
has survived as the fittest. In man il
will be the first or great big toe.
From recent issue of the Chicago
Tribune we learn that the Illinois Gem
tral Railroad Company believes it has az
last found an engine that will run
without smoke, The smokelessness is
due to the fact that it will successfully
burn anthracite coal. The engine whose
construction will admit of this novelty
in coal consumption is monster of its
kind. 1t has just been built at the Bald
win Locomotive Works; it has made
mile in forty-seven seconds; it's weight
on the drivers is 81, 900 pounds. and its
total weight when fully furnished and
in running order is estimated at 1850
pounds.-N. o. Times Democrat.
"A beam of sunlight is made to pass
through prism so as to produce the
solar spectrum or rainbow A disk
having Sits or openings in it, is made to
revolve and the colored light of
the rainbow is made to break
through it and fall on the silk,
wood or other material in glass vessel
AS the colored light falls upon it sounds
will be given by the different parts Of
the spectrum, and there will be silence
in other parts. If the vessel contains
red worsted and the green light flashes
upon it loud sounds will be given. Only
feeble sounds will be heard when the
blue parts of the rainbow fall upon the
vessel.
Prof. Marshall of England, tells us
that the oak, in a general way, requires
to grow from one hundred and twenty
to two hundred years before it is fit to
cut for large timber. Left alone it may
live for one thousand years, but the pro-
portion of good timber in trees after
certain age rapidly diminishes, There
are many trees still standing in England
which are from eight hundred TO one
thousand years of age, perhaps the best
specimens being those in various parts
of what was once Sherwood Forest The
oak rarely bears fruit at all before it is
fifty to sixty years old, and seventy to
eighty years is a more general age.