The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1897-12-10


When donkcys learn to sing and dance,
When pigs talk politics;
When London il Il town In France,
When two and two make six;
when drops OF rain are rea! pearls
-, when coal Is clear and white,
Then little boys and little girls
May sit up late at night.
i &c. Clifton Bingham in New York Tribune
The Fly In Amber.
A valuable collection of amber is being
| exhibited in London, which il attract
| ing much attention from both naturalists
and the public. Most people know that
| amber, away in the dim ages. was gum
of the most transparent and liquid kind,
which oozed from the pines growing in
countries near to what is the Baltic sea
Of our day. The trees decayed and mill
gled with the soil, but the resin was
stored up by nature, and when, as the
centuries rolled ON, the earth began grad
ually to sink and the sea washed over
what was once dry land, the wood soil
was upheavcd and the hard gum carried
OF ny the waves to be dropped to the
| bottom of the ocean. There the action
OF the water, in the course of further
ages. slowly converted the Jumps of resin
into the fossil. which ocean currents have
since disturbed, and often cast back on
| the cOASts. 1t was in UOZing from the
pine trees that the liquid resin caught
| up III it's course insects and other things
which have been wonderfully preserved
Ants and spiders, lichens and leaves.
flowers and fruit of species and kinds I'M
known to recorded history, are to be ex-
amlned With az 'nn:; facility as if they
stood Oh an object glass. and OF such Il
| delicate consistency was evidently this
trickling gum that the winged insects
have been imprisoned without the slight
| est damage to their fragile forms.
The finest specimen in the London col
| lection contains a fly, very much like the
species which today is common the world
over. 1t seems to be poised in mdair. the
fashion. with the light playing on their
sauzy texture showing them in ever
changing hues. The legs are long, and
the fine hairs covering them are plainly
| discernible; even the eyes are preserved.
| There are some ten insects in another piece
OF amber about an inch square, including
Il couple Of spiders and an insect looking
very much like a mosquito. Another
specimen contains five flies. and, while it
| is evident from the peaceful attitude of
| tour Of them that the overwhelming proc
ess was Immediately effectual one ap-
pears to have given last kick. and that
death struggle of an insect many thous-
day in the disturbed appearance of the
| fossil gum. Another small block holds a
spider OF quite ferocious aspect. and his
| eager attitude would almost suggest that
| he was already on the track of victim
when death overwhelmed him instead.
imprisoned i'll yet another piece is Sp-
! der which appears to have died in the act
Of carrying to a safe place it's white sack
of eggs. Feathers of birds, the wood of
extinct trees. the hairs of mammalia, liz
ards and scorpions are also found in am
| Der; and so fine and thin must have been
| the gum in its original state that in flow
| ing it took casts of most beautiful plants
and microscopic forms. and of plants and
| leaves of trees long since passed away.
In cutting the amber containing insects
the great object is to clear away the stone
so as to leave the imprisoned specimen
| rs hear the surface as possible. Much
care and skill are required in the task
| for if the cut is made too deep and the
| air reaches the insect it Immediately dis
appears in minute particles of dust.
Diver and Shark Fight.
Andrew Cameron, a solid Scotch lad
yesterday morning on the Ward line
steamer Yucatan from Vera Cruz, Mex
| leo, bringing with him story of fight
with a shark. Cameron is Il deep-water
diver, and says he has gone to greater
| depths than any other diver in the bust
ness: His story is corroborated by J. w.
Field, an engineer in the service of Pear
son 4 Son, the contractors, who are re-
| building the basin where Cameron WAS
employed.
Three months ago Cameron was sent to
| Vera Cruz to work in the basin. built out
from the main entrance to the port. He
had three men to assist him, one of them
| iI<r Who man 11-nr lpI
on Il float with !; ladder running down
| from it into the water. Cameron was
| clad in the regulation suit or armOr worn
| by dcep-water divers. He had been work
ing for two months and a half without
any accident During his frequent de-
scents he had discerned at times the out
lines of dogtiSh or young sharks, but these
never bothered him.
| At about $3.50 o'clock on the morning
of October 16 he went eighty feet below
the surface. Besides his tools he had ii
dirk eighteen inches long and two and
| one-haf inches wide in the belt of his
rubber suit.
Il had located loose pile and had
started in to tighten up the bolts which
had worked out" he said yesterday.
when l was conscious Of something
passing over me and obscuring the light.
| | leaned back and saw a shark fully ten
| feet long apparently about to attack me.
He was moving around not more than
foot above by helmet. dropped the
wrench which l was working with: aud
snatchcd out the dirk. l moved my
head to one side. and reaching up slit
the sharks throat twice. He sank down
around my feet, and I tried to get be-
hind pile. l pushed myself as quickly
as | could, but the heavy lead clogs on
my feet would not let me move as fast
as I wanted to-. Before l could draw in
my left leg behind the pile the shark
turned over Oh his back and made a rush
at me. His jaws closed on my left leg.
and his teeth went clean through the
quarter inch rubber cloth. The force
with which he rushed against me con-
| fused me so much that did not feel the
bite. After this he let go and tioated up
ward toward my head with his belly eX-
| posed. l drove the dirk into his belly
and ripped it up toward his mouth. cut
ting his stomach through. He then
tloatcd up to the surface.
| when l first stabbed him l had sig
nailed to King to be hauled to the sur
face, but he misunderstood my signal.
fortunately. If he had started to haul
me up feel sure that the shark would
have bitten one or both of my legs off.
as he would then have had clean
chance at them. The holes which his
teeth made in rubber cloth let in the
water into my suit, and it rose to my
chest. where it was held by the air
pressure. l signallcd to King imme-
diatcly after plunging the dirk into the
sharks belly. but his carcass had
reached the top before King got the sig
nal, and. guessing what had occurred. he
started to haul me up in hurry. When
I reached tho ladder hanging from the
float I was too much exhausted to seize
! it. and they had to lift me on the float by
main force.
"My left knee was dislocated and the
flesh below it lacerated. l remained UNI
der the surgeons care for several days
until the Yucatan arrived. My leg is
partly paralyZcd.'
Cameron says he has made the deepest
dive on record. having descended 200
feet into Loeb Craig in Scotland on last
April 16, to recover the bodies of an en-
gneer and fireman in locomotive that
had fallen into the Loeb. He will not
appear in dime museum. but will sail
on Saturday for England.-New York
Sun.