The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-02-09
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

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A remarkable new style of telescope is
about 10 be built by Astronomer Thad-
deus S. c. Lowe, the founder Of Lowe Oh
servatory at Pasadena, Cal. after the
plans or an inventor named Gothmann
says the Philadelphia Record Mr. Goth
mann mann claims 70 haye found a cement in
Whlch a number of small lenses can be
set 10 form them into a biz one. which
would expand and contrht with exact
eVenness with the glass unler changes az
temperature. The cluster d .enses would
therefore remain in exact lhe and focus
at all times. Mr.. loves Ida is 60 build
a io SORT OF hy.s-eye telescope, which would
comprise one central lens surrounded By
successive circles of six, twelve eighteen.
tWenty-tour and thirty lensesA Thus, py
means means OF ninety one individual lenses,
inches in diameter. Such a te.escoDe
would not only be monster novelty, but
1 Mouiu PROBABLY secure much clearer stellar
views IMAM any yet recorded.
An Eighth street 1eweler di4plays in
his show window a big trayful o. nickel
case cas- " watches labeled Correct Tine-keep-
6Is, 81, says the Philadelphia Record
Ihey are not designed for children's pisy-
Shlngs, but are real, sure-enough strictly
business watches that not only 90, but
keep good time. To be sure, they could
hardly be depended upon to run railroad
trains by, but they serve all ordinary Dllr-
poses sufficiently wen. They are not guar
anleed as 10 accuracy of wear, but the
same establishment offers watches at s.. 50
warranted to keep correct time for two
years. That dollar watch said the
dealer sold for $40 te% years ago but
the Improvement in the machinery for
making the parts has been such in the last
Two years that factory equipped for
manufacturing the cheap articles can turn
out watches almost as fast as clothespins
are made. No, they are not full jeweled,
ailnough some people expect the pins and
Shafts to be set in diamond sockets and
even then they think there is so much
proht in a dollar watch that | ought to
throw in locket or charm as a sort of
chrome"
Marching Through Georgia" the ia
Vorite of military bands, and sometimes
called THE American Marseillaise." was
written in Chicago in 1866 bv Henry G
Work, remarkable song writer. SAYS a
writer in the Ladies' Home Journal He
was printer, and often composed the
words of song at the case" as he set up
the type. and then, if he had access to
music type, he would also compose in his
mind and set up the music, these pieces
seldom requiring more than two or three
alterations. Marching Through Georgia"
was thus composed without ever being put
IN manuscript. Mr.. Work wrote Wake
Nicodemus Father, Dear Father, Come
Home" Loss of the Lady Egin," and
among two or three hundred others, NV
Grandfather's Clock which brought him
a handsome return "My Old Kentucky
Home" is said to have been suggested to
stephen G. Foster on hearing an old ne
gro speak with love and longing of his old
home in Kentucky. Several of Mr.. Foster s
pest songs We're composed on pieces of
brown wrapping paper, in the back room
of little grocery store in New York.
Laurence Hutton. in ST. Nicholas, is
telling what boys did in old New York, I'M
der the title of "A Boy Knew" In the
February number he says: Johnny Robert
son and The Boy had one great supersti-
tiOn-to wit, Cracks! For some now mex
plicable reason they thought it unlucky to
step on cracks; and they made daily and
hourly sDectacles of themselves in the
streets by the eccentric irregularity of
their gait. Now they would take long
strides. like a pair of ostriches, and now
snort, quick steps, like a couple of robins
now they would hop on both feet, like a
brace of sDarroWs; now they would walk
on their heels, now on their toes; now with
their toes turned in, now with their toes
turned Out-at right angles, in splay-
footed way; now they would walk with
their feet crossed, after the manner of the
hands of very fancy old fashioned piano
PldyeIs, sklRsR}lnS from pdSe 70 tIepIe1I
over cracks. The whole performance would
have driven a sensitive drill sergeant or
ballet master to distraction. and when
they came to a brick sidewalk they would
go all around the block to avoid it. They
could cross Hudson street on the cobble-
stones with great effort, and in great dam
ger Of being run over; but they could not
possibly travel upon brick pavement and
avoid the cracks. What would have hap
pened to them if they did step on a crack
| they did not exactly know. But for all
their own free will.
1t is a long-discredited fable. of course,
says the New York Post, that the porcu-
pine shoots his spines at a tormentor, just
as we no longer believe that it lays eggs
or brings water in its quilts to its young;
but the seed of truth in the matter is the
fact that the quilts are so loosely attached
to the flesh as to be readily detached, and
in fact some may be f1irted out when the
animal shakes himself vigorously-some
ha 70 col
Moreover, each spine is needle-Dointed,
and minutely but strongly barbed, so
that it stisks in whatever touches it, and
| II Immediately comes loose from the SKIN.
| Thus any animal that leaps upon or bites
a porcupine finds its paws, shoulders, and
mouth full of detached quilts, which SO
divert its attention for some time to come
| that it rarely notices the escape of its
would-be victim. Every movement of the
| muscles causes them to penetrate deeper
and there seems no limit to their int1am-
| matory and often fatal traVe4s. our
! friend spends much of his time aloft
! sometimes remaining for weeks in a single
big tree CASUALLY hemlock). Curled up in
| some deep fork or hollow, he dozes away
| the daylight, and at night feeds upon its
! twigs and leaves. Beginning at the top
| most spray, he will gnaW and ciD away
every bit of fresh bark, sprouting twic
and leaf, and circle regularly downward,
| taking each branch in succession out 10
| its very tip, despite his weight and awlx-
wardness (by pulling the outermost slen-
| der twigs, within reach of his teeth and
| continuing until the whole tree has been
| despoiled of every edible particle. Then,
| having literally eaten himself out of house
and home, he chooses another tree and re-
peats the process.
The state of New York owns about
800 acres of land known as the Onondaga
salt springs reservation, the rights OF the
| state being based on a treaty made with
| the Onondaga Indians more than hun
| dred years ago, says the Chicago News
The manufacturer who occupy these lands
| hold them for the most part under grants
made by the commissioners of the land
| office. Salt manufacturers are of two
| classes-"Solar salt and fine salt" MAX
ers. The first and larger class utilities
| the rays of the sun for the purpose OF
| evaporating the salt water and by this
process the purest salt is made. Coal and
kettle take the place of the sun in the
| manufacture of fine salt" The Salt
| Land reservation is divided into four dis
| tricts, of which that known as the SYRIA
cuse' Is the most important writer
IN current magazine describes his visit
TO this district as most interesting A
large stone pumphouse is built into the
side of steep cliff at a short distance
from the Erie canal, whose waters are
used TO operate two enormous pumps
large enough to throw a barrel of brine
at a single stroke uD into the large re-
ceivng vat just under the roof of a high
U