The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-09-17
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

NlAiSullS VI putting IL 10 any praCtlcdl use
lies in the fact that it must be stored and
transmitted at a temperature of more
than 200 degrees below zero.
-Curiously enough, neither In classics
nor in mathematics this year have the
women students at Cambridge won a
place in the FIRST class. 1t is the first for
many years that there have not been both
women wranglers and also first classes in
classics.
The report comes from Providence, R.
l., that when laborers were removing a
day or two ago the ruins of the Masonic
temple that was burned year or more
ago, they found a smodering fire that
burst into fame as soon as air was adj
mitted to the embers.
The famous column at Trajan is 127
feet high, composed of thirty-four blocks
of marble and sculptured from top to bot
tom. There are $500 human figures in the
sculptures, besides almost as many horses
and several military engines. Its summit
is reached by spiral staircase of 1874
steps.
The Philadelphia councils committee
arose in wrath when it found that its
Independence day badges were marked
July 5, 1897" and sent them back TO the
brating the Fourth" said one, although
the celebration is to be held on the 9Th"
in a recent article in Science, DR.. Brin-
ton calls attention to the fact that the
missionary Haverstadt was so well pleased
with the language of the Ataucanian In
dams of Chile that he published a work on
it in l777, advocating its adoption as uni
versal tongue for the world, a. ready-made
Volapuk.
The largest single structure in the
world for audience and spectacular pur-
poses is the Coliseum at Rome. Ii is in
the form of an ellipse; it's long diameter
is 6l5 feet; its short, $40; the hight of the
outer wall, 164 The arena is 21S feet dong
by l76 broad. The tiers of seats accommo-
date 100000 spectators.
Eastern roofs are generally fiat, for
comfort during the summer season. The
roofs of houses in the east are often used
as outdoor gardens. The Greeks gave the
roof slight elevation in the middle the
Romans increased it to one-fifth of the
span. The high pointed roofs of modern
times are of German origin.
The Roman aqueducts. were marvels
of architecture. The Anio was forty-three
miles long; the Martio forty-one, of which
l. 1rCdOGS
seventy feet high. The Claudia was forty
seven miles Gong, the arches 100 feet high
The Roman aqueducts brought 10000, 600
cubic feet of water daily into the city, and
the various sections of the metropolis were
supplied with water by 1854 pipes
The popularity of cycling has Won
derfully increased in Spain of late When
one hears that 5000 cyclists have signed a
petition to the parliament in Madrid for
improving the roads it may well be sup
posed that the roads in Spain are in very
bad condition. In Russia, also, cycling
has enormously increased during the last
few years, but it is difficult to believe
that last winter cycles were often used
instead of sleighs
An ingenious form of blackmail easily
worked on account of the mysterious ways
of French justice has just come to light
in Paris. Two clerks in the Palais de
Justice made it practice to find out what
persons examined by the judges d in
struction were not to be prosecuted. They
them through a middle man, offered to
use their influence to obtain a nolle prose-
qui for money. They have been arrested
and a thorough showing up of corruption
by Paris court officials is promised.
"A special study of hereditary drunk
enness has been made by Prof. Pellman
of Bonn University. Germany, says an
exchange His method was 70 take GER
tain individual cases, a generation or two
back. He thus traced the careers of chill
dren, grandchildren and great-grandchil-
dren in all parts of the present German
empire until he was able to present tabu-
lated biographies of the hundreds descend
ed from some original drunkard. Nota-
BILE among the persons described by Prof
Pellman is Frau Ada Jurke, who was born
in 1740, and was a drunkard, a thief, and
tramp for the last forty years of her
life which ended in 1900. Her descendants
numbered S34, of whom 700 were traced in
local records from youth to death One
hundred and six of the 100 were born out
of wedlock. There were IA beggars, and
81 more who lived from charity. OF the
women, 1S1 led disreputable lives. There
were in this family 76 convicts, of whom
were sentenced for murder. In a period
of some seventy-ive years this one family
rolled up a bill of costs in almhouses, pris-
ons, and correctional institutions amount
ing to at least 100000 marks, or about
81, go, 900.
The negroes of the West Indies use the
great toe constantly in climbing, says a
writer in the Overland Monthly. Several
years ago, while spending some time at
one of the famous resorts in jamaica, / had
an opportunity to observe the skill with
which the black women, who do a great
part of the mental labor, carried stone
mortar, and other building materials on
their heads to the top of five-story tow
er, in part of the hotel not then finished
Much of the unerring accuracy with
which they (women and girls chased each
other up and down the long ladders, with
heavy loads skillfully poised on their wool
ly pates, was due to the f1rmness with
which they grasped each rung of the lad
ders with the great toe. They did not
place the bail or the hollow of the foot
on the rung, but the groove at the juno
ture of the great toe with the body of the
foot, and they held fast by making the
back of the other toes afford the other
gripping surface. In much the same way
the Abyssinian native cavalry grasp the
stirrup. And 1 have seen a one-armed
Santo DOMINICAN black, astride the near
OK in wheel yoke, guiding a lead mule
with rein held between his great and
second toes, while his only arm was de-
voted to cracking his transfers whip.
Two of the small leopard, or fox.
snakes belonging to Assistant Curator F.
NJ. Woodruff of the Academy of Sciences
did an egg-swallowing act which astound
ed the owner vel aa Ct,roto, L Z,