The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-08-07
ITEMS OF INTEREST.

ACCORDING TO the Engineer, the Gen
eral Electric Company of Berlin has
just completed. near Naples, in the val
ley of Pompeii, an electrical plant of
considerable size. The installation con-
sists of three horizontal turbines of $50
horse power each, which work at 100
revolutions per minute. The current
lat a voltage of 5000 is carried on an
aluminium conductors to Pompeii, Sar-
no and Tore Annunziata. At the lat
ter place it is chiefly used in the mac
aroni factories.
An American officer who has just
returned from Cuba says that the po-
litical parties of that island have the
propensities of all Latin races. That is,
they cannot have two-sided fight, but
instead divide up into three or four
factions Thus in Havana there are
four parties, each with a different lead
er. Among Latin races, as l have stud
led them in South America it appears
to be question of leaders more than
of principles. A new man comes to the
front, with an engaging personality,
proclaims himself a leader and a man
of destiny, and the crowd falls in be-
hind him. The idea of a battle of prin-
clpleS or OF issues as brought to them
from the United States is new to the
Cubans, and believe it will take them
many years to accustom themselves
to it,
"A man connected with a large de-
partment store is thus quoted in the
Philadelphia Record: II have under me
about one hundred and fifty girls
salesgirls, wrappers and clerks. All of
them are healthy looking, and, yet
noticed that they got sick a tremen-
dous lot The other day / had occasion
TO go to their cloak ROOM and there 1
saw a sort of roster neatly typewrit-
ten on one wall. Mondays it said,
Miss Brown, Miss Smith, Miss Jones;
Tuesdays-Miss Bell Miss Willing,
Miss Gray And so on. / wondered
what it meant, and then all of a sud-
den the scheme dawned on me. 1 took
a copy of 1T. With that copy / can
now tell beforehand what girls will
plead illness on any particular day of
the week. A wonderful thing, wasn't
It? But it isn't in operation any longer.
The general health of my department
is much better than it was"
Two in bed is the usual custom
of sleeping, in the United States at
least, and also in Canada and Eng
land. But in Germany and France.
says Good Housekeeping, single beds
are the rule. The latter plan is more
healthful and comfortable 1t is a
gradually coming into use in this
country Single beds involve more lin
en-, more work in making beds and
more washing, but l never knew a
FAMILY to return to the old plan after
once giving single beds fair trial.
Especially in summer is the single
bed to be preferred, or even sleeping
on the floor, to two in a bed Many
families declare they never know what
comfort was, during the hot summer
nights, until they adopted the single
beds. l might add a word of protest
against allowing babies or young chill
dren to sleep with old people. The lat
ter certainly draw upon the vitality of
the former This is probably true as
between any bedfellows one of whom
is sickly or less strong than the other,
Consumption and other diseases have
often been communicated from one
bedfellow to another.
1t seems anomalous that gasoline
and naphtha launches should be ex-
empt from inspection when the agent
used for power or fuel is much more
dangerous than either steam or gun
powder. Within certain limits, gasoline
is safe enough, but those in charge of
1T do not know or understand how mar
row the limits are. Gunpowder will
only explode by actual contact with
fire, but gasoline, in evaporation or ex-
posed. renders the air itself infiamma-
BILE for many yards around, and needs
only the presence of fire to explode vi
olently. Within few days, a launch
was taken to the oil works for a sup
ply of naphtha; those in charge of the
operation filled the tank too full, and,
as consequence, naphtha ran all over
the bottom of the boat. Regardless of
this, some one in the boat lighted a
match, when the usual result FOLLOWED,
and the man will probably die, the yes
sci itself being destroyed. Yacht own
ers should not take every one who pre-
sents himself, pretending to know the
nature of these volatile fluids; men say
they understand that they must use
great care, without in the least COM
pretending the nature of the care. That
naphtha- flooded yacht was not fit to
use for many hours, or until every yes
tige of the naphtha had been removed.
Although nearly all the famous por-
traits of Mr.. Sargent, R. A, have the
air OF having been dashed off in a mo-
ment of inspiration, they are, as a mat
ter of fact, produced with that infnity
of pains which is said to be a sign
of genius, says the London NJ. A. p.
Sitters are apt to find Mr.. Sargent a
most eXacting artist, and he has been
known to demand as many as a hun
dred sittings for a single portrait He
is, however, quite capable of the dash
ed-off-in- a-moment' style, as the fol-
lowing new and true anecdote will
show One morning not long ago he
was waiting in his studio for the ar
rival of a lady who was to give the
painter the fortieth and last sitting for
her portrait. She was not due for an
hour and a half, and as Mr.. Sargent
waited he grew suddenly dissatisfied
with the almost finished portrait Seiz-
ing a rag, he wiped out every trace of
his work, and set himself furiousy to
repaint the lady entirely from memory
By the time the sitter arrived the pic
one of Mr.. Sargents most brilliant can
vases. What one chiefly admires In
this incident is. not the painters mar
vellous facility, but his courage in de-
stroying the work of weeks on the
chance of being able to produce a more
hfelike portrait in an hour and half.
"A dispatch from Canadaigue N.
Y. says: Peter Gruber, whose fad is
rattlesnakes. has a new suit made en-
tirely Of rattlesnake skins. The coat.
vest, trousers, hat, shoes, necktie and
gloves are all made OF the skins of
these reptiles. The buttons are made
from the rattles. The scarfpin is a
gold mounted fang, and the watch
chain and charm are of the vertebrae.