The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-05-21
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

Louis XII of France, having made a
certain bargain with King Ferdinand or
Spain, found that Ferdinand had griev-
ously cheated him, whereupon he made
complaint of his dealings. The Spanish
KING made answer 10 the court as fol-
lows: "The King of France is complain
ing that 1 have deceived him twice; he
lies; 1 have deceived him more than ten
times"
An actress of the Deutsche theater in
Munich, says the Pail Mall Gazette, is
suing the owner of the theater. who is
not it's director. on the following grounds:
In her contract there was a paragraph
sbpulating that "a member of the theater
who marries without permission of the
director forfeits all claim TO salary"
Nhen the proprietor refused to pay her
her salary on the strength of that mar
rlage-deterring paragraph the actress
wrote to him that she had not married
without the directors consent, inasmuch
as II was the director whom she had mar
ried, and it could scarcely be maintained
that he would have married a lady With
out having given her permission. The pro-
prieior nevertheless declined to pay, and
so the Munich courts must now decide
whether she married with or without con-
sent.
The question of the relative merits of
steel sleepers as compared with wooden
ones has long been a vexing question to
| the railroad officials having to do with
| such matters. There is no doubt now,
however, that steel sleepers are superior
TO those of wood, in some cases, according
| to the report of an official of the Neither
land State Railroad. From this report it
| "a Do
pany of Switzerland now has 20 per cent.
of its own track laid with iron or steel
| sleepers. They began to use the metallic
| sleepers sixteen years ago. ana have kept
| a carful watch upon them all the time
! The road is crooked and has long tunnels
| and steep grades. When the sleeper of
average weight is first put on it costs
about I.90, but when taken out 1T is well
| worth something, and the net cost would
| therefore reach about $1.6S each. After
| the first two years the cost of keeping
| the track in order is decidedly lower with
| metal than with wooden sleepers, and the
| lateral displacement of the tracks on
curves is less. In long tunnels the steel
| sleepers rust, SO that they last only eight
or ten years and on tangents in long tun-
| nels wooden sleepers are still used. The
reports state that except in tunnels the
sleepers Of the metal will last as long as
the rail.
Most of the higher animals-as mon
keys, elephants, bears, horses and dogs
have a natural fondness for fermented
| liquors, and suffer from the abuse of these
| liquors as men do, says Lippincotfs. From
| the book of Maccabees it is evident that
war elephants were maddened of old with
new wine, as they have been and are
with arrack down to the present time.
| Managers of menageries and employees at
the various geological gardens know that
the elephants under their care are pre-
| pared TO go on a wild drunk whenever
| opportunity offers. Whisky is officially
given them when they are i'll or low-tne
| quantity varying from five to ten gallons,
| according to the requirements of the case.
| This is put into their drinking water.
| Bears and monkeys drink beer like Ger
man students, and love whisky equally
| well. In Africa the natives make use Of
| this evil to capture their poor rela tons.
The monkeys there are extremely fond OF
a beer brewed by the natives. So the
latter place quantities of the liquor within
easy reach of the monkeys and wait until
their victims are thoroughly befuddled. In
this state they are unable to recognize the
| difference between negro and ape. When
the negro takes the hand of one of them
to lead him off a second monkeys takes
the hand of the first, a third that of the
second, and so on. A single negro may
sometimes be seen carrying off a string
of staggering monkeys. Fresh doses of
beer in decreasing quantities are admins
tered to the captives, so that they may
only gradually awaken to the sad results
of their spree.
The search for building material
among the ruins of ancient cities saws
the American Journal of Archaeology. is
a custom which in Crete has assumed
incredible proportions. It may almost
be said that stone quarries are an IN
known thing on the island and that all
the village builders, except in a few
places which are too far off from ancient
settlements, work with secondhand ma
terial. One of the principal centers of the
trade in the materials from ruins is the
territory of Gortyna. At this point tho
ancient structures, which are thckly scat
| tered over a vast area, are built with an
excellent limestone, which is both strong
and easy to work. The peasants have
nothing to do but to excavate a half-meter
below the present level to find walls, which
extend to a further depth of two or three
meters, and which, when freed and taken
TO pieces, give, with but little work, a
profit many times greater than that of
several years cultivation of the land it
self. The stones are sold to those who are
building houses in the villages near the
ancient city, and also exported to the other
villages of the Mascara plain and to the
peighboring provinces. The Turkish gov
eminent, so jealous in preventing the
work of explorers who come to carry on
scientific work or excavations, pays no at
tention whatever to the work of destruc-
ton which is daily going on under its eyes.
In fact when it has public constructions
to erect it goes so far as TO procure its
materials by the very same system, thus
often tearing down important monuments.
which disappear without leaving a trace
of their former existence.
Although every one has his feet meas
ured for shoes, says the New York Sun.
there are very few persons who know
what the sizes marked upon the shoe stick
mean. There are two shoe sticks in use
IN America and Europe. The stick used
| "a Tinted