The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-10-12
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

There are lots Of people whose opin-
ions as to the origin and meaning of
names is entirely erroneous, says an ex-
change Thus, instead of Smith being de-
rived from blacksmith, ironsmth, or any
thing of the kind, il really means "the
man who smiths Miller comes from the
old Morse Meiia, our mill and maui, and
means a "mauler" or Fighter" Bacon
is from the High German verb bagan. ito
/ hight and means the nghter;" IIgg and
Bigg are from the same source, the Ger
man pichan, TO slash" Hogg is the An
gio-Saxon hyge Scholar Tanner is the
| German 'Thanger;" the old German
| "Donegand," meaning the "Dane-Goth:
Ringer is the Anglo-Saxon "Wring-gar"
! or 1.-The mailed warrior" In fact, bet
ter research will speedily convince one
that there is more in names than most
people imagine.
The smallest steam engine in the world
was made by Philadelphia boy when he
was 16 years old, and was recently exhib-
tied at the Nashville exhibition The ge-
MUS who built it, a man now, Cyrus Cham
oers by name, during his life has produced
number of valuable Inventions but there
is not one of his productions upon which
ne sets such store as upon this achieve
ment OF his boyhood. The little engine
weighs less than half an ounce and can
be readily carried in the vest pocket YET
Notwithstanding its microscopic dimen-
slons 1t is perfect machine and when
the Few drops of water it's tiny silver boil
er will hold are converted into steam the
engine will run at the rate of 1900 reyolu-
tlons per minute. In type it is a high
pressure beam engine. and it is construct
ed principally of gold and silver. All told
there are over $50 pieces In it's makeup.
some Of them so small as to be almost in
Visible without the aid of a magnifying
glass. The diameter of the cylinder is
one-siXteenth of an inch; diameter of flv-
Wheel hve-eighths of an inch. The boiler
is made of silver in five distinct plates. or
sheets. There are no rivets in either tba
boiler or any other parts of the engine.
Inc separate parts are all held together
by tiny screws.
One of the great faults of the niano
says the Chicago News, has always been
its inability to sustain the sound in pas
sages where even and prolonged tones
were required and many attempts have
oeen made to overcome the "percussive"
erect caused by the blow of the hammer
on the string. In one of these modfica-
uons revolving cylinder was made to
press against the particular wire to be
Vlorated. The result was a passable imi-
tauon OF the ng-drawn-out melody pro-
duced on the violin and cello. The in
strument, however. never appealed to mn
slclans, for the life and expression which
only the artists bow can produce were
lacking. Much more satisfactory effects
are said to have been made possible in
piano on a new principle, which has been
invented in Germany. The strings are
stretched across the sounding board as in
the ordinary piano. but the entire ham,
mer mechanism is absent. The pressure
Of any of the keys puts in action mag
net winch automatically attracts and re-
leases the Wire, thus producing vibrations
without the metallic stroke that accompa-
mes the sound in common type The re-
suit upon the tones is described as re-
markable. The high notes resemble those
OIL an eolian harp; the middle and lower
notes suggest the music of the cello. or
the organ. The instrument responds read
ily 10 every vibration in power and in ex-
preston prompted by the performer. and
note can be sounded for several minutes
without any perceptible variation in
quality.
-Four years ago, says Harper's Round
Table, Dr. Stuhlmann, one of the most
Sciehtihc Of African explorers, brought to
Germany two dwarf young women, about
II ana 20 years old. They had been cap
tured by Arab slave-raiders in the great
forests northwest of Victoria Nyanza. A
man about % years old and four feet six
inches in hight, who was captured with
them, was in DR.. Stuhlmann's care for
several months, but died on the coast lust
before ne was to go to Europe He was
so very shy that he was never seen TO
look a white man in the face and though
he would talk little Ki-SuaheH, the Ian
guage of the Zanzibar natives he was
never heard to speak a word of his own
language. The girls were taken back to
Africa in a few months as il was feared
they would not survive a German winter
n a he ina . lr1-
mann, he was able to get from them only
sixteen words of their language Perhaps
this is not very surprising. 1t was enough
TO make persons of a low type of culture
shy and suspicious to be shut up for hours
at time with inquisitive servants. who
were continually looking at and question
ing and measuring them, turning them
this way and that and photographing
them; and though the little women were
well cared for and much was done to
amuse them, they could not get over the
idea that the whites had some sinister pur-
pose. They feared they would be poisoned
and never touched any dish before their
Italian servant mad first tasted it, They
were carried around from one scientific So
ciety to another, all over Germany and
Belgium, and 1t is safe to say that in their
private opinion anthropology was a great
bore, and they were very glad 10 get back
to Africa.
-"Oxford county, Maine, turns out
nearly all the spools on which the sew
ing thread of this country is wound" said
wholesale dealer in such articles to a
writer for the Washington Star. "The
spools are made from white birch timber,
and they are produced by the million in
Oxford county. There are many other
parts of Western Maine also, where the
industry is important. There are numer-
Gus saw mills in that part of the state
which are kept busy all the year round
saving white birch logs into strips four
feet long and from one to two inches wide
and of the same thickness. These strips
are sent to the spool factories where they
are quickly worked into spools by the
most ingenious labor-saVng machinery.
The strips of white birch are fed into one
machine, and they are not touched-in
fact, are hardly seen again-until the
spools, all finished for market, except
polishing, drop out by the bushel from an
other machine several rods away from
where the strips started in. The spools
get their gloss by being rapidly revolved
in barrels turned by machinery. the polish