The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-05-07
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

Telegraph wires viii last for forty
years near the seashore, but in the man.
A1facturing districts the same wires will
last only tensyears. and sometimes less.
Gases against George Washington ap-
pear here and there in the civil docket re-
Gently unearthed in the court house at
Greensburg, Penn. No less than three
claims were entered against him during
the year 1851 TO compel him TO pay taxes
The humorous clerk, commenting on these
actions, remarked: George Washington
Esq, appeareth not like taxes"
In Nagasaki. Japan. there is fire
works maker who manufactures pyrotech-
mic birds of great size that, when ex-
ploded, sail in alifeli1e manner through
the air and perform many movements ex-
actly like those of living birds. The Sc
cret of making these wonderful things has
been in the possession of the eldest child
of the family of each generation for more
than AGO years.
"A handful of sand of medium fneness,
100 grains to the inch, win contain 1,O000C0
grains, if 1t measures one cubic inch, and
thus philosopher or child may grasp the
million. To get into trillions would re-
quire pile of sand one mile in its length,
breadth and thickness. At this we stand
amazed, but TO get somewhere near the
possible variations in the 1O0-square, the
magic square of to 10000, we should have
to lay down such handfuls of sand each
of Million grains, from the earth to
Aldebaranl
The production of salt in Peru is an in
dustry now carried on in the form of a
government monopoly, the proceeds being
devoted to the fund for redeeming the ter
ritory lost to Chile during the late war
with that country The expectation of this
product for the year 1896 was very large.
About 1900 tons were sent to Colombia,
$4,000 tons 20 Chile and about 1880 tons
, 10 Ecuador, making a total of $500 tons
exported during the year. The amount
utilized for domestic consumption was 49,
145 tons, and the industrial consumption
was 1900 tons, making the total production
for the year 16S, 945 tons.
The Oldest oak tree in France, the St.
Bernard oak, at Cunfin, is more than S25
years old having been planted A. d. 1910,
and is mentioned in the "Annales Eccle-
siastiques du Diocese de Langres." 1t
measures twenty-five feet in circumfer-
ence al the collar of the roots, and is for
ty-two and a half feet high TO the first
W,
wood has nearly all disappeared, leaving
little else than the bark which, too, has
been eaten away in spots; one of the holes
is large enough to let a man inside. A
niche was made in the upper part of the
trunk by the cure of Cunfin in 1749, and
the statue of the Virgin was placed in ii.
That was swept away during the revolu-
ton, but the old tree still lives.
"A French scientific journal publishes
some particulars as to the consumption of
tobacco, which, according to the figures
obtained from the minister of finance, is
decreasing in that country, being at the
present time about two pounds per head
of the population annually, whereas IN
Holland it is seven pounds, in the United
States five pounds, in Belgium and Ger,
many three pounds, in Austria Hungary
two and one-haf pounds, and in Canada
about two and one-quarter pounds. The
consumption in Sweden and Prussia is
about the same as in France 1.-TWO pounds),
while in Great Britin il is not quite one
and one-half pounds. The same statisti-
clan is also responsible for the calculation
that the consumption of matches in Eu-
rope is 2,000,000,000 in the course of twenty
four hours, being on the average twelve
per capita in Germany, nine in
Belgium, eight in England, and only six
in France, where they are of such bad
quality that one would have supposed the
consumption must be proportionately
greater than in any other country.
The diking of the Niemen Delta, emp
tying into the Gulf of Courland, near the
boundary of Russia and Germany has
been completed This delta Is formed by
the meeting of the rivers Russ and Gilge
the soil of the delta is continually water
soaked, and when ice blocks the rivers the
high tides at times cover all the delta.
This was the condition previous to 1892,
when a project was adopted for building
new dixie, eighteen miles long. almost
parallel to the shores of the Gulf of Cour-
land and uniting the old bikes of the riv-
.ers Russ and Gilge. This dixie has an av-
'erage hight of Sc feet a width of 50 feet
at the top, and is made of sand and clay
resting upon a substratum of sand rela-
lively resisting. Where this dixie cuts the
secondary arms of the two rivers nine
locks are located, which were useful dur
ing construction and in afterward con-
trolling the flow in these branches. Six
pumping stations operated by electricity.
are also erected for draining the land in
side of the bikes. The territory thus dix
ed in has an area of about "A, 500 acres. The
total cost of the work was about $50 NOO
of which sum $3S000O was expended upon
the bikes and $4,000 upon the drainage
plant.
An ordinary passenger car on a steam
railroad costs from $1,000 to $500. and
weighs 5000 pounds, or nineteen tons. A
mail car, which costs from 5000 to 81 ZOO
and is shorter by about one-quarter than
the ordinary passenger coach, weighs 90
900 pounds, or sixteen TONS A baggage
car, without the baggage in it, weighs %
600 pounds, or fourteen tons, and costs
about as much as mail car. A sleeping
car is more expensive than any of the 9TH
ers, and 1t weighs a good deal more. too.
A plain, simple, but durable sleeping car
with observatory attachments, literary an
mex and culinary department, costs any,
where from $4,000 to $4,000 The average
weight of sleeping car is from % TO %
tons, says the Boston Globe A fun train
in motion as a little figuring wiz show.
is no light affair. The ordinary WEIGHT
of the railroad locomotive for passenger
service, inclusive of tender, but not of fuei
in the tender, is 40 tons. One bagra oe
car weighs IA tons and one mail car 16
tons, bringing up the weight of the loco
motive and the bagga pe a ma rpou <,,,o , .