The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-07-21
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

/ ei-NAAA III tAlf7 bowels OF the GarEn. Tor
such case il was believed that the face
OF the beholder was liable to be twisted
/ round so as 10 look behind him ali the
| rest of his life. Robert Burton however,
| IN discussing subterranean devils saws
| lhat the metal men in many places &C,
count it good luck. a sign of treasure and
| rich ore, when they see them" These
| lmpS are, of course the Aneal descend
! ants of the dwarfs Of Teutonic mythology;
! put Northern Europe has no monopoly
IN such supernatural jewellers under
ground, though their characteristics vary
| with their localities. Gervase of Tflbury,
| an Old chronicler of the twelfth century,
| tells or dark, unfathomable lake on the
| almost inaccessible summit of Mount Can
| iSou, IN the Eastern Pyrenees, where the
| demons nave dwelling that is like a pal
! ace Tor size, but to most people both the
palace and the demons themselves are in
| visible. II any one drops stone or other
| sohd substance into the lake, a tempest
| Immediately breaks out, as though the de-
mons were enraged at the insult.
Probably the Oldest letter in the world,
| says the Washington Star, is the letter of
| Panbesa written fifteen centuries before
| Christ, to his friend Amenemapt a scribe
| The manuscript is of perishable papyrus,
| and it IS amazing that it should have sur
| ViVed for more than thirty centuries and
| sun be IeSible. It is preserved in the
| collection of the British Museum II has
| been several times translated during the
present century. 1t presents an interest
ing picture of life in Egypt in the time
| Ol Rameses II. 1t is more in the nature
| Oh literary production, a poem composed
| in celebration of the visit of Pharaoh to
| the city of Pa-Rameses, than an ordinary
| letter of to-day. Panbesa "geets his Iord,
! the scribe Amenemapt to whom be life
health and strength" and then goes on
| to describe the verdant fields the thresh
ia vim o~d- t1n
| olives, the orchards of figs; the great daily
markets with their fish and water fowl
and swarms of purchasers. The citizens
had their sweet wine of Khemi pome-
granate wine and wine from the vineyards,
| and 10 these they added "beer of Kati."
| There was music in plenty furnished by
the singers of the school of Memphis
on the whole, Pa Rameses seems to have
| been a pleasant place to live in. 1.-THE
| lesser FOLK are there equal with the great
folk, and Panbesa writes that its maid
| ems were Gin holiday attire every day.
with locks 'redolent of perfumed oil"
"A meteorite, described as half the size
of st. Pauls Cathedral. London is said to
have fallen at Port Alfred, South Africa,
says the Independent. 1t made hole in
| the ground 50 feet deep 100 feet long Pnd
60 feet wide, which would make it the
| largest known meteorite on record. Being
a single piece, apparently, it was probably
| solid iron, like other meteorites known
| some of which have weighed a number of
tons, but none of this size is recorded.
! And yet there is no reason to believe that
multitudes very much larger may not
| be travelling in the celestial spaces: and it
| IS only good luck that prevents our fall
| Ing in with them. There is no inherent
| impossibility that meteorite or little as
| terOid as large as some of the multitude
| thaC reVolVe between Mars and Jupiter
might come within the sphere of the
| earchs attraction large enough to cover an
entire state. They may be even moving
in the tracks of comets, although we know
perfectly well that the bulk of the mate
rial of comets is very inconsidera BILE and
the earth has more than once passed
through the tail of a comet without any
more effect than a shower of falling stars.
What the effect would be of striking the
head of comet we do not yet know
The SCOT of the acetylene flames rep
resents a valuable product, especially for
the color industry, says Mining and En-
gineering. When an acetylene gas is burn
ed with a smoking fame three to four
times as large a quantity of SCOT is OBJ
tanned as from the same quantity of min
eral oil. The acetylene SCOT Is very light
and exhibits an absolutely black color
without any tinge of brown. Besides, all
tarry admiXtures and other substances
contained an lamp black etc, are absent
from the SCOT. 1t is very bulky and will
be specially adapted for India ink, as well
as for colors used in printing and lithog
raphy A recent French patent, issued to
E. Hubon, gives three methods for the
production of the color. According 10 the
| first the acetylene gas as kept in a steel
| cylinder under two atmospheres press
ures and is then ignted through an cleo
trio spark or a glowing platinum wire by
way of explosion. The final pressure of
the resulting hydrogen does not exceed
twelve atmOspheres, 50 that the danger of
an explosion is excluded if Steel cylinders
of corresponding strength are employed.
This method has the advantage that the
| theoretc yield of carbon is obtained from
| the acetylene, the product being of the
greatest purity.
-Thorny and spiny plants and plants
with singing hairs are supposed to have
been evolved in the same manner as pro-
tecled insects says the Westminster Re-
view. Thus, those plants which. tended to
produce spines and singing hairs were
| preserved in each generation while those
not doing so were destroyed The first
difficulty here is that of understanding
how an animal in the habit of browsing
on certain kind of plant could be sup
posed to avoid a plant here and there be-
cause it was-as we must suppose it was
| at firsJ-Very slightly spiny or had en-
bryonic singing hairs The second diff
ticulty is that browsing animals do not
avoid the perfected thorny or spiny plants,
or even the stinging nettle. Sea-holly Is
one of our most spiny plants, and yet on
the Norfolk coast, where IL grows abund-
antly, the horses browse on it freely. The
donkey's fondness for thst,es is proverbial
and many browsing animals eat furze;
while the nertle is eaten by snahs, several
| species of caterpillar, as well as by cattle.
And it cannot be supposed that browsing
animals have been evolved pari passu with
the plants, so as to enable them TO feed
on the same, for the staple of their food
is grass, and they do not need the others.
When we think of grass, again. We feel
another difficulty. For the grasses are the
plants most browsed on by animals, and
in which, most of ali, anything in the way
of spininess ought to have been developed.
Yet these same grasses have, according to
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