The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1893-08-26
FOREIGN GOSSIP.


I'm Chin a traveller wishing for .
passport is compelled to have the palm
of his hand brushed over with fine oil
paint; he then presses his hand on thin
damp paper, which retains an impress
sion Of the lines. This is used to pre-
vent transfercnce of the passport, as
the lines of no two hands are alike.
A man named Schneider deserted
his wife in Thessingen, Bavaria, came
to America, and here committed biga-
my. Learning, some years later, that
his first wife and died, he returned to
his old home, and is in Jail there. The
report of his vife's death was merely a
rusc to get him in the clutches of the
law.
1T is believed by the engineers and
officials of the enterprise that the Man
chester ship canal will be opened for
traffic along its entire length, from
ruary or March. If the practical COM
pletion is retarded beyond that date it
will likely be by legal rather than en-
gineering difficulties.-N. Y. Sun.
"A hot-v~atcr fountain is now in
operation in Paris. The water that
feeds the fountain passes through a
coil of copper tubing three hundred
feet long. By dropping a sou in a slot.
jets of gas are turned on and ignited.
BY this means the water is heated.
For each sou one is entitled to eight
iters. 1t is expected that this foun-
tain will be a great assistance to the
poor, and, if successful, others will be
built.
Denial is made in st, Petersburg to
the unfavorablc reports recently pub
lished in Great Britain and elsewhere
regarding the prospects of the coming
harvest in Russia, and to the sta tement
that the government would. in conse-
q.1ence, prohibit the export of rye.
The present condition of the crops, al
though unsatisfactory in the govern
ments of Podolia, Kieff, and Cherson,
is excellent in practically all other dis
tricts.
japanese gardens are the most
fairy1i<e of places. You see in them
tiny trees and Towering plants, ponds,
bridg cs. summer-houses. lanterns-here
dwarf pines SIX or eight inches high,
but one hundred and twenty-five years
old: there others one foot high, but
five hundred years old. In the garden
of feijugin-within the temple grounds
there are many Peony plants, mostly
old. but one is one hundred years old,
and is eight feet high-quite tree.
There is in Spain a river. called
Tinto. which has very extraordinary
qualities. Its waters, which are yell
low as the topaz, harden the sand and
p-.rify it in a most surprising manner.
If n stone falls into the river and rests
upon another they both become per-
fcctly United and conglutinated in a
year. 1t withers all the plants on it's
banlss we'll as the roots of trees,
which it dyes of the same hue as its
wator. No fish live in it's stream.
There is no dou bt that South Africa
is regarded a present as the most prom
Using field for development in the pro-
duction of the precious metals. The
continued extension of mining opera
tions in the Transvaal. and the more
recent rediscovery of the ancient gold
fields of Mashonaland and the Mata-
bcle country. seem to be drawing
miners and mining-engineersf from other
countries in considerable numbers, and
the movement is likely to continue for
some time to come.-Engineering and
Mining Journal.
"A story comes from Irl<utsk, the
capital of eastern Siberia, of a dog
seven months old that has suddenly de-
veloped the faculty for making sounds
so like a human voice that person in
the next room could not tell the differ
ence. The dog seems to have no COM
prchension of the meaning of the
words he utters, but he readily repeats
anything that is said to him in shrill,
boyish-sounding voice. Some days he
seems to lose the faculty or to be disin-
clined to exercise it, but on others de-
lights to say anything he is told.
Gen. Dodds says in his report On
the Dahomey campaign that the Lebcl
rifle gave entire sa tisfaction. The car
tridges were in no way affected by the
voyage out or by the climate of Daho-
mey. S,nolSeless powder and the old
kind were used in the way of expert
ment in several engagements. The
smoEeless powder proved by far the
more satisfactory. The old powder
drew the fire of the enemy instead of
masking the detachment using it, and
the troops using the smol<eless powder
much less than the others.
RAMADAN AND BAlRAM.
Tho NIahometan Month of Day Fasting