The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-04-07
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

II mas not been adopted 10 any great
extent, chiefly because the appliances
have been expensive and not because the
current costs too much to compete with
coal, oil or gas.
Germany will endeavor to be its own
mold of form and glass of fashion"
Berlin will soon see a fashion exhibit
by which it Is hoped that special fashions
for German women will be established
The managing committee will include
members of the highest society.
The instances are certainly numerous
in which the most successful leaders in
the field have been far below the aver
ages both in height and weight, says the
Army and Navy Gazette. Why the Lit
tie Corporal himself would never have
become soldier maybe if his fate had de-
pended, on one of these war office boards,
and 1t is questionable whether the nation
would now have been honoring Little
Bobs." 1t alb seems SO funny, the craze
for bigness.
The caravan that goes to Mecca each
year with the sacred camel, the Sultan's
presents and the new carpet for the
prophets tomb had rather bitter ex-
perience this year, according to a Con-
land Plain Dealer The annual payment
to the Mecca authorities of $4,000 was
not forthcoming and the expedition was
delayed. This year the government was
more impecunious than usual, and the
caravan had to start with the promise
that the money would be forwarded to
Beirut. But when the pilgrims arrived
there the money without which they
could not proceed, as tribute must be
paid to the tribes on the road had not
been sent. kilograms arrived at Constan-
tinople begging for money and the gov
eminent did all 1t could to obtain it, with
out success. At last, in the middle of the
night, the director of the Anatolian Rail-
way was called up 10 the palace and
agreed to make an advance of $4,000, but
nobody knows on what terms.
British experts admit that the cannon
at present in position in Spain could shell
the new harbor, but declare that British
guns absolutely dominate them and could
prevent anything like an effective bonn
bardment. In addition to this, the bat
teries of the rock facing westward have
been immensely strengthened and new
additions are made to them constantly
The points on the opposite shore whence
hostile Spanish guns could fire are well
known and are absolutely exposed to Brit
ish batteries. They say, moreover, that
it is an axiom in artillery combat that
the attacker cannot secure any real effect
until the enemys fire has been subdued
1t is impossible, they hold, to subdue the
fire of Gibraltar, and therefore the new
harbor will offer sufficient security as
the whole district from which hostile fire
can be directed can be swept by pro-
jectiles from Gibraltar. The suggestion
of harbor on the other, or eastern,
side of the rock is regarded as impracti-
cable, and the floating dock, which has
been advocated, would say the experts,
be open to torpedo-boat attack.
Only recently a story was circulated
in a block of coal which split open while
it was on the fire, says the London
Standard. There now comes a similar in
stance from Lincolnshire. Some work
men repairing a bridge at Afford, on
reaching the middle of a concrete wall
about eighteen inches thick, found a liv-
ing toad sitting in a little hollow, away,
to all appearance, from light and air 1t
was covered all over with white carbun-
cles of great size. The local supposltion
is that the reptile was built into the
bridge on it's erection, fifty-six years ago.
Several naturalists have attempted to
.toads to live for any time in such posi-
lions and state that when a young one,
having left its tadpole state, seeks shell
ter in a hole or crevice of rock or tree
it finds abundance of food by catching in
sects, which, like itself. creep within such
cavities They say a good deal more, all
tending to prove the impossibility of the
nevertheless stubborn fact. So did some
of the doctors in a play of Moliere, main
tanning that their patient could not have
escaped death, according to nature, or, at
any rate, their conception of it. The
Marquis de ST. Maur in Caste exclaims,
"Eccles! there is no such a man as Ec-
cles" what do you call this?" is the
retort of Sam Gerridge's father-iu-law-
elect, striking a picturesque attitude. II
the toad could speak it might do the
same.
Profs. Liveing and Dewar have lately
studied the inert gases of our atmos-
phere by liquefying air by contact with
the cooled walls of vessel at 200 de-
grees c. The more volatile portion was
distilled over into spectrum tubes after
it had been freed from every trace of nj
trogen, argon and the compounds of car
bon. The tubes showed the spectra of
hydrogen, helum and neon with great
brilliancy, and also large number of 9TH
er lines which could not be referred to
any known origin. This result showed
that a sensible proportion of hydrogen
exists in the earths atmosphere, a point
that has been much disputed. Owing to
the velocity of the hydrogen molecule it
has been taken for granted that free n.y.
drogen would escape to outside space. II
this be true, and if hydrogen is, never
theiess, present in our atmosphere it is
argued that there must be a continued
accession of hydrogen to the atmosphere
from outside space, as well as a contin-
ued escape. 1t is likely too, that there
will be a similar transfer of other gases,
and the authors therefore sought for the
characteristic lines of the nebulae of the
aurora and of the solar corona. Nebu-
lar lines were, in fact, found and in such
conditions as to suggest that some of the
(unknown) gas that makes up the nebu-
lac is really present, in small quantities,
in our atmosphere. Several lines were
seen that may be coronal in their origin.
1t is not certain that aurora lines were
visible.
Gen. A. p. Leeper of Owaneco ILL.,,
has started paper called THE Lunatic
Herald" designed for circulation among
lunatics. In his salutatory he says that
he has the best record in the country as
a hrst-class lunatic, having been de-
clared insane three times, and having
been committed five times 10 the Illinois
Central Hospital for the Insane. He is
also about to take a postgraduate course.
he has dacfdaA 10 fcGi1a a